Gateway National Park – Jamaica Bay Unit

MOSQUITO APOCALYPSE! We went to our site to set up camp but got attacked by mosquitos the moment we stopped walking. I’m talking clouds of mosquitos. Droves of mosquitoes, swarms of mosquitos. We move to another campsite. Same deal. We tried a sunnier campsite. Same horror movie. I’m an avid backpacker– 500 miles of the Appalachian Trail. I’ve never seen an infestation like this. They a alit on our exposed areas by the dozens every time we stood still for a scant second. It was a cool, dry, sunny day! Imagine what it would be on a hotter muggier day! We had to leave. The 3 minutes we were in the campground afforded us 50 bites between the two of us. A very bad experience.
Unfortunate.because the staff are uncommonly friendly and informative. One staffer even gave us a ride out of there.

This place is a tough one to review because while the location made it possible for us to camp, the camping experience was less than desirable. The reality is — for a campground in the city, it’s great, but a campground in the city is terrible. And if you read nothing else in this review, just know that site T15 is the best option.
I’ll start with the positives. For a one night camping excursion out of the city, this is the only option for a 24 hour car rental that you don’t want to spend entirely in the car. The staff here is EXTREMELY friendly, a little quirky, but very accommodating and knowledgable. The spiel she gave us on local restaurants and bars was funny given that we came here to get out of the city and cook over a fire, ha. We enjoyed ourselves because it was technically camping, we were able to enjoy a fire, and we were a laid back, go with the flow bunch.
Now, for the negatives. The noise level was far beyond what I had even imagined. There were races going on with lots of cheering for hours, jets directly over head from JFK throughout the night and into the morning, helicopter pilot training from about 8am until 8pm, and the ‘open concept’ campground contributed site-​to-​site conversation into the soundtrack. The mosquitos were manageable during the day, but terrible in the morning and they ate me up as soon as i got out of the tent and before I could put on our 99% deet bug spray. Their were a bunch of raccoons! We had been warned, so we made sure to put all of our food up, but they still poked around our table while we were awake and we could tell they had pawed at our cooler overnight. The flushable bathrooms, a small walk away, were nice but only open during business hours and the rest of the time there were outhouses for use. I prefer to just go behind a tree but between the hours of the flushable closing and it getting dark, I had to use the outhouses. To be expected, they had a bunch of gnats and kinda smelled. We were in site T15 which was far and beyond the most secluded site in the place. The booking map was very deceiving because it looks like campsites along a trail. NOPE this place is an open field. Some of the sites didn’t even have shade, those people looked like they were baking! We saw some of the RV sites were set up on the tarmac in a concrete jungle and their were some tent sites just off of that. Booking here is a total crap shoot. If you can’t get T15 — who knows what you can expect with your site.
If you have any other alternatives, go there. If you don’t, come here, it’s not the absolute worst.

Like most of you who will be reading this review, I was looking for a place close to NYC to camp overnight with a few friends, but didn’t want to spend too much time traveling out of the NYC area. This was one of my friend’s first time camping, and as such, we choose Gateway National Park (Floyd Bennett Field). Here is some information that we wish we had known before booking. Overall, it was good to get out of the city, but there are some downsides as described below.
1) Get some good bug spay cause there are lots of mosquitoes. A couple of trails were actually closed due to the mosquitoes in the area. However, once we lathered ourselves with insect repellent with 99.9% Deet, the bugs didn’t mess with us too much.
2) The raccoons come out at night. We were informed that there was a raccoon problem, and that you should put all of your food before dark. The person was right. Make sure you bring something to store the food in (cooler or other locking container) and you will not have any problems.
3) The campsites are pretty much in an open field. Sites T14 and T15 have some privacy, but the rest are open for everyone to see. Also, the grey on the campsite map is a real depiction of the paved areas. The areas surrounding the campsites are old paved runways, so expect cars and motorcycles driving around the area.
4) Noise… what noise? Having previously participated in a couple of 5Ks at Floyd Bennett Field, I knew that there could be some activities there during the day. However, we were truly surprised at the incessant woman on the loudspeaker screaming «3.2.1.GOOO!», the guy practicing landing a helicopter from 2:00 — 8:00 PM, the jets flying over to land at JFK until 11:00 PM (not too bad, because the noise was mostly subdued by the woman on the loud speaker), and the jets taking off starting at 6:00 AM (this was a LOUD wake up call).
5) There are flushable and clean bathrooms by the camp store that are open from 8:00 AM to 7:30 PM. Also, you can purchase firewood at the camp store. The staff there are very friendly and can also provide tips on local food and entertainment.

Love this spot to camp. They have a camp store and there used to be a very kind older lady who worked here and this year there seems to be a grumpier older lady. I think that being polite to customers is important but I didnt recieve that. There are tons of racoons in the camp site area so be careful and put away all the food up in a tree or else there will be a late night snack party on your picnic table.

I camped at Floyd Bennet Field which is the closest campground to NYC. I ran into some issues with booking the site online, only to show up and have someone steal my site. There wasn’t much NPS Rangers could do since the half drunk camper and his extended family physically moved the camp site sign to another location and denied doing so. That was annoying. Despite the awesome location on a abandoned airfield, there is way too much dangerous car traffic here to make this a secluded camping spot. We walked in after a taxi ride from NYC and on-​site were almost hit by vehicles on multiple occasions. NPS Police were pulling people over however there is way too much car traffic in general here for the police to enforce.
There is too much car traffic, even at night, to make it a secluded spot. This is essentially an airport runway where cars drive around in numerous directions all night. I was surprised that cars had almost unlimited access to the park on every unmarked runway and road. When walking around the site, I saw cars traveling at least 50 MPH in a 15 MPH zone. People were practically drag racing, doing donuts, motorcycles speeding along here. The NPS could greatly improve the situation by limiting car traffic and reducing the amount of speeding where people walk.
There would be a good view to the water from some camp sites, however it is blocked by ugly large tall Winnebago motor homes all along the view. NPS should consider moving these large motor homes elsewhere to give everyone the chance of a beautiful water view. The place I saw looked like a giant trailer park.
The park does have it’s perks. There is a shower at the ranger station (near the camp site). The ranger station bathrooms are in practically new condition, just bring your own soap. The rangers themselves are very friendly, helpful and knowledgeable. It’s one common things I have found with NPS staff. Contrary to the other reviewers below whom were busted for illegal drinking, I found the ranger staff to be very kind and helpful. You must have been doing something ridiculous to have that experience.
There is a bike rental place at Aviation Sports, which is walking distance from the camp site. You can rent a half day on a bike for $ 20. There are some cool biking paths all the way to Jacob Riis Park which then leads to Rockaway Beach. This is certainly worth it. NPS has a bunch of sea Kayaks which looked amazing. There are some amazing old airport hangers around here which could make a good photo shoot, unfortunately most of this is closed to the public. There are also a number of wooded areas also closed to the public.
We took the bike trail from the park to Rockaways. It was truly amazing. There is an abandoned Coast Guard station right over the Rockaway bridge. I really wish the federal government would turn this into a museum or something. The bike path is missing some crossing spots and gets dangerous near the Coast Guard Station, however otherwise is amazing all the way to near the Rockaways.
For camping this place is below average. It has so much potential and it’s hard to believe a place like this exists in Brooklyn. I hope NPS invests more in restoring the history parts of this park and reducing the amount of traffic (especially at night) moving in audible distance from the camping areas.

spent a lot of time here. it’s a little ragged, underdeveloped, seemingly neglected. but spend some time at the various regions of Gateway National Recreation Area, and you will find people who cherish these open wide quirky places, and folks who are dedicated to its history, lore and nature. Yes, I said nature. There is nature here, you just hafta spend some time and pay attention. Tons of birds, 250 or so species, migrating and native throughout the year. Then there’s snakes, turtles, frogs and toads. Wear a mosquito net in the summer, chill a little, ride your bike around if you got no car. Go up the lookout at Ft Tilden and you’ll see a view of NYC you never expected. walk the beach at Riis, Tilden and Breezy Point, explore the North 40 at FBF, wander through Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge. dip into the ocean. these environs are a rarity in NYC and make big city living all the more bearable. Kudos for the National Park Service!

Breezy Point. What could be bad? The second the mercury hits 80, I’m here.
I adore the old shanty town outlying the park here, too. It actually makes you feel as if you’re, well, by the water. Go figure.