Psycho Killer Visits Lunatic Asylum on Roosevelt Island - Shoots Cormorants

Unable to ride his bike across the 59th Street Bridge on the day of the New York City Marathon, David Byrne takes the Tram to visit Roosevelt Island. His impressions:

Wanted to bike to Long Island City, but the Queensboro Bridge bike lane was closed (for the handicapped they said, though it was completely empty). Took the Roosevelt Island tram instead (the view is from there), and rode down by the abandoned lunatic asylum. There was no one around. From the tip of the island one has a great view of the UN building and a rocky island filled with cormorants — an odd sight for NYC.

He liked the views from Southpoint Park. Maybe he thinks these views should remain unobstructed and opposes the Louis Kahn/FDR memorial. I don't know but would hope so. Here is his shot of the Cormorants. David Byrne's Talking Heads were one of my favorite strange bands along with Warren Zevon, Ian Dury and Frank Zappa. I would be hard pressed to think of a more unusual or appropriate experience then hanging around with these guys at Roosevelt Island's lunatic asylum. Unfortunately Zappa, Zevon and Dury are in Rock and Roll heaven but maybe they can get a day pass. The island just off the south end of Southpoint Park with the Cormorants is named for former U.N. Secretary General U Thant and is according to Wikipedia:

a tiny 100 x 200 foot (30 x 60 metre) artificial island in New York City's East River, just to the south of Roosevelt Island. It lies across from United Nations headquarters at 42nd Street, and is legally considered a part of the Borough of Manhattan and New York County. The islet is currently protected as a sanctuary for migrating birds, including a small colony of Double-crested Cormorant, and access is prohibited to the public. The island has its origins in the 1890s as a side-effect of the construction by William Steinway, of piano manufacturer Steinway & Sons, of trolley tunnels under the river to link bustling Manhattan to his eponymous company town in Steinway, Queens. The island was built up on the existing granite outcrop Man-o'-War Reef with excess landfill from a shaft dug down the reef to the tunnels. But Steinway died before his tunnels' completion, and it was financier August Belmont, Jr. who finished the project in 1907, leaving the finished islet as a bonus.

You Tube video link of Talking Heads Psycho Killer is here. UPDATE - Roosevelt Island 360 advises that:

I thought U thant was the next isand with the tower. Byrns pic is from the islet that is closer to us with I thought U Thant in the background?

I think he is right. I don't know the name of the Island in the picture. Here is picture of U Thant Island from Wikipedia.