United Nations Headquarters

United Nations Headquarters

Coordinates: 40°44′58″N 73°58′5″W / 40.74944°N 73.96806°W / 40.74944; -73.96806

United Nations HQ
  • مقر الأمم المتحدة (Arabic)
    联合国总部大楼 (Chinese)
    Siège des Nations unies (French)
    Центральные Учреждения Организации Объединенных Наций (Russian)
    Sede de las Naciones Unidas (Spanish)

United Nations Headquarters in New York City, as viewed from the East River.
General information
Location New York City, New York, United States
(International Territory)
Address 760 United Nations Plaza, New York, New York 10017, United States
Coordinates 40°44′58″N 73°58′5″W / 40.74944°N 73.96806°W / 40.74944; -73.96806
Construction started 1947 (1947)
Completed 9 October 1952 (1952-10-09)
Height 155 metres (509 ft)
Technical details
Floor count 39
Design and construction
Owner United Nations
Architect Oscar Niemeyer

The headquarters of the United Nations is a complex in New York City. The complex has served as the official headquarters of the United Nations since its completion in 1952. It is located in the Turtle Bay neighborhood of the borough of Manhattan, on spacious grounds overlooking the East River. Its borders are First Avenue on the west, East 42nd Street to the south, East 48th Street on the north and the East River to the east. Turtle Bay is occasionally used as a metonym for the U.N. headquarters or for the U.N. as a whole.

The United Nations has three additional, subsidiary, regional headquarters or headquarter districts. These are located in Geneva (Switzerland), Vienna (Austria), and Nairobi (Kenya). These adjunct offices help represent UN interests, facilitate diplomatic activities, and enjoy certain extraterritorial privileges, but only the main headquarters in New York contains the seats of the principal organs of the UN, including the General Assembly and Security Council. All 15 of the United Nations' specialized agencies are located outside New York at these other headquarters or in other cities.

Though it is in New York City, and part of the United States, the land used by the United Nations Headquarters is under the administration of the United Nations, while also being subject to most local, state, and federal laws. For award purposes, Amateur radio operators consider it a separate "entity", and for communications the UN has its own internationally recognized ITU prefix, 4U.

The United Nations Headquarters complex was constructed in New York City in 1949–1950 beside the East River, on 17 acres (69,000 m2) of land purchased from the foremost New York real estate developer of the time, William Zeckendorf. Nelson Rockefeller arranged this purchase, after an initial offer to locate it on the Rockefeller family estate of Kykuit was rejected as being too isolated from Manhattan. The US$8.5 million purchase was then funded by his father, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who donated it to the city. The lead architect for the building was the real estate firm of Wallace Harrison, the personal architectural adviser for the Rockefeller family.

Read more about United Nations Headquarters:  Planning and Construction, International Character, Structures, In Popular Culture, Public Gatherings, Relocation Proposals

Famous quotes containing the words united, nations and/or headquarters:

    I am colored but I offer nothing in the way of extenuating circumstances except the fact that I am the only Negro in the United States whose grandfather on the mother’s side was not an Indian chief.
    Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)

    The customs of some savage nations might, perchance, be profitably imitated by us, for they at least go through the semblance of casting their slough annually; they have the idea of the thing, whether they have the reality or not.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    What does headquarters think these guys came over here for, a sewing circle? They go up playing for keeps. Cops and robbers with rocks in the snowballs. Brass knuckles and lead pipes and a roughneck conviction they can lick any man in the world.
    Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)