Central Park

Central Park ({{coor dms|40|46|59|N|73|58|20|W|}}) is a large urban public park (843 acres or 3.41 km²; a rectangle 2.5 miles by one-half mile, or 4 km × 800 m) in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. An oasis for Manhattanites escaping from their skyscrapers, the park is well-known worldwide after its appearance in many movies and television shows, which has made it one of the world's most famous city parks.

History

The need for a great public park as New York City expanded was voiced by the poet William Cullen Bryant and by the first American landscape architect, Andrew Jackson Downing. A stylish place for open-air driving, like the Bois de Boulogne in Paris or London's Hyde Park, was a need felt by many influential New Yorkers. In 1853, the New York legislature designated a 700 acre (2.8 km²) area from 59th to 106th Streets (a section from 106th to 110th Streets was added later) for the creation of the park. The roughly 1,600 working-class residents (most of them African-American and Irish immigrants) occupying the area at the time were evicted under the rule of eminent domain. (see Seneca Village.)

Related Topics:
New York Cit - William Cullen Bryant - Andrew Jackson Downing - Bois de Boulogne - Hyde Park - 1853 - Seneca Village

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The State appointed a Central Park Commission to oversee the development of the park, and in 1857 the commission held a landscape design contest. Writer Frederick Law Olmsted and English architect Calvert Vaux's "Greensward Plan" was selected as the winning design. In the execution, sculptural detail was provided by Jacob Wrey Mould. During the peak years of initial development, Olmsted and Vaux employed some 20,000 skilled and unskilled workers.

Related Topics:
1857 - Frederick Law Olmsted - Calvert Vaux - Jacob Wrey Mould

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Several influences came together in the "Greensward" design. Landscaped cemeteries, such as Mount Auburn (Cambridge, Massachusetts) and Green-Wood (Brooklyn, New York) had set an example of idyllic naturalistic landscapes. The most influential innovations in Central Park's design were the separate circulation systems for pedestrians, horseback riders and pleasure vehicles, with "crosstown" commercial traffic (almost non-existent at the time of the design) entirely concealed in sunken roadways screened with densely planted shrub belts, so as not to disturb the impression of a rustic scene. There are some 36 bridges designed by Vaux, ranging from rugged spans of Manhattan schist or granite, to lacy neo-gothic cast iron, no two alike. The ensemble of the formal line of the Mall's doubled allées of elms culminating at Bethesda Terrace, with a composed view beyond of lake and woodland, is at the heart of the larger design.

Related Topics:
Mount Auburn - Green-Wood - Schist

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The Saw Kill was dammed to make the Lake (illustration, left), and the spoil was laid as a curving earthen dam, with the carriage drive laid on it so naturally, that few today realize it is a dam. The solidly frozen Lake is a thing of the past, now that the Park is at the center of an urban heat island.

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Central Park was run down and hit a low at the end of the 1970s, when the Central Park Conservancy was founded (1980). The Conservancy restores and maintains the park under contract from the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, an early successful public private partnership. The city has transferred direction of ongoing restoration and maintenance to the Conservancy.

Related Topics:
1970s - New York City Department of Parks and Recreation - Public private partnership

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Notable features of Central Park include Strawberry Fields, Bethesda Terrace, the Belvedere Castle.

Related Topics:
Strawberry Fields - Bethesda Terrace - Belvedere Castle

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Many encroachments on the park have been fought off over the years: within the Park are the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Central Park Zoo, ranged behind the pre-existing Arsenal, Manhattan's oldest.

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Although often regarded as a kind of oasis of tranquility inside a "city that never sleeps," Central Park has had a reputation over the years as a dangerous place, especially after dark. This reputation probably began in the 1930s, when large encampments of homeless people known as "Hoovervilles" sprouted up in the park. Well-publicized incidents of violence and rape, such as the infamous "Central Park Jogger" case, have contributed to this perception.

Related Topics:
1930s - Homeless - Hooverville - Central Park Jogger

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However, as crime has declined in the Park and in the rest of New York City, many of these perceptions have become exaggerated or outdated, and the use of common sense is enough to protect visitors from harm. The New York Police Department designates Central Park as its own precinct, the 22nd, and it has been noted that a large percentage of the crimes in the park, particularly assaults, occur between people who know each other, as opposed to being random attacks. With more than 25 million visitors annually and fewer than a hundred crimes in all of 2004, Central Park is by far one of the safest urban parks in the world.

Related Topics:
New York Police Department - 2004

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