[4][5] Hell Gate covers a wide range of topics that include, but are not limited to, political corruption, local street performers, and strange subway advertisements.

[5] The founders of Hell Gate, Nick Pinto, Esther Wang, Christopher Robbins, Max Rivlin-Nadler, and Sydney Pereira, began developing the idea for the publication in 2021.

[4] Pinto, Robbins, and Rivlin-Nadler had all faced job instability as journalists due to companies mismanaging resources, lacking funding, and cutting budgets.

[7] In January 2022, they pitched the idea of Hell Gate to fifty local journalists, and recruited Pereira and Wang.

[7] The team decided that their publication would have a snarky tone like pre-acquisition Gothamist, and that they would approach stories from a human rights-oriented perspective.