[1] The western entrance to 116th Street at Riverside Drive is flanked by a pair of white apartment buildings with curved facades, The Colosseum and The Paterno.

[2] The top of The Paterno is capped with an architectural fancy masking a water tower in a shape that conjures up a section of Mansard roof, complete with dormer window.

In 1953, during Dwight D. Eisenhower's presidency at Columbia, however, the block between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue was permanently closed to vehicular traffic and was turned into a pedestrian way called "College Walk."

The main, east-west thoroughfare portion of 116th Street begins at the eastern edge of Morningside Park and runs east through central Harlem.

The story is about Lutie Johnson, a single young black mother, who moves to 116th Street to give her son better opportunities.

116th Street and Broadway is the opening scene of The Caine Mutiny (1951) by Herman Wouk as Willie Keith is being dropped off by his mother to join the Navy in World War II.