Central Park turns 150

[Stern]

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Happy birthday: Central Park, the nation's first designed urban park, turns 150 this year.

Central Park turns 150

By Jerry Shriver, USA TODAY

NEW YORK — Long before this metropolis became famous for skyscrapers and neurotic citizens, civic leaders declared the need for an accessible pastoral refuge — a "central park" — where the wealthy could promenade in carriages, urchins could breathe clean air and the masses could just relax under the elms.

That was in 1853. Eventually, when all of the political wrangling, land grabbing, swamp dredging, bench building, tree planting and grass seeding was done, the result was 843-acre Central Park, the nation's first designed urban park. It celebrates its 150th birthday this year.

At a news conference April 29, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and possibly first lady Laura Bush are scheduled to announce a seven-month slate of special events to be highlighted by a birthday party July 19, a film fest and several concerts (details at www.centralparknyc.org). Bloomberg has called the celebrations "a tribute for the ages."

"We're going to have something for everyone to do, and we anticipate lots of New Yorkers will celebrate the park that means so much to them," says Regina Peruggi, president of the Central Park Conservancy.

Park experts from around the world also will join in. They're coming for a conference in June that will explore how the private, non-profit Conservancy has teamed with the city to run and finance the park and implement $300 million in improvements since 1980.

That partnership is widely credited with rescuing the park from its crime-ridden days of the mid-1900s and turning it into a showcase that is visited by 25 million people a year.

"We concentrate on the fact that this is a very fragile place, and unless it's kept up, it could easily deteriorate to where it was," Peruggi says.

Today the masses are lured by the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Tavern on the Green, the country's top-grossing restaurant; an outdoor theater offering Shakespearean plays; a zoo; band shells blasting world-music beats; and dozens of memorials honoring personalities as diverse as John Lennon and Beethoven and a sled dog named Balto.

But they also still come to promenade, breathe deeply and soak up the enduring landscape of lakes, meadows and forests laid out by architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux in their 1857 "Greensward Plan."

And to fall in love.

Says Michael Patrick King, executive producer of HBO's Sex and the City, which has filmed several memorable scenes at the park: "Central Park is a soft, natural oasis in the center of this concrete and steel city. It represents the romantic heart that still beats inside our big-city girls."

By the numbers:
*
Annual visitors: 25 million.
Total acres: 843, including 136 acres of woodlands, 150 acres of water and 250 acres of lawns.
Perimeter: 6 miles.
Miles of trails: 58 miles of pedestrian paths, 4.5 miles of bridle trails, 6.5 miles of Park Drive.
Benches: 6,000, which would stretch for 7 miles laid end-to-end.
Cost of "adopting" a bench: $7,500 to $25,000.
Cost of "adopting" a tree: $1,000 to $100,000.
Original construction cost: About $14 million from 1858-73 ($200 million in today's dollars).
Restrooms: 17.
Hot dog/ice cream vendors: About 50.
Horse-drawn carriages: About 70 in the city, most in Central Park.
Playgrounds: 21.
Endowment of the Central Park Conservancy: $72 million.
Feeding times for penguins at the zoo: 10:30 a.m., 2:30 p.m.

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The Bow Bridge, completed in 1862, is Central Park's most famous -- and picturesque -- bridge. Located in the middle of the park, it spans 60 feet and links Cherry Hill with the Ramble.

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As you can see, little has changed since people walked across the Bow Bridge for the first time 141 years ago. It has been the backdrop for many movie shoots and countless wedding pictures.

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An estimated crowd of 125,000 attended a Mass given by Pope John Paul II in 1995.

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A man with friends in slightly lower places, Garth Brooks packed them in for a 1997 concert. Other high-profile acts to play free shows in the park include Simon and Garfunkel, Diana Ross and Luciano Pavarotti.

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The kids took over the Great Lawn in 1995, when approximately 100,000 people gathered to watch "Pocahontas" at what is thought to be the largest movie premiere in history.

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The Central Park Zoo began in the 1860s with the donation of a handful of swans and a bear cub. One hundred and fifty years later, it boasts 1,400 animals of more than 130 species.

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The open-air Delacorte Theater has presented free summer performances in Central Park since 1962, with at least one Shakespeare production each year.

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A young girl in a goat cart demonstrates the best way to get around Central Park in the early years.

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The goats have been replaced by horses in front of this hansom cab, but Central Park's primary mode of transportation hasn't changed much over the last 100-plus years.

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One of the more somber moments in Central Park history took place on Sept. 11, 2002, when a candlelight vigil marked the first anniversary of the terrorist attacks.

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Ice skating was so popular in the 19th century that New York newspapers regularly reported the condition of the park's ice-covered ponds, according to the official Central Park Web site.

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Central Park's first carousel opened in 1871 but was destroyed by fire in 1954. The park replaced it by acquiring this 1908 treasure from Coney Island.

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It's not often that you see farm animals grazing in the shadows of skyscrapers, but this 1930 photo demonstrates the origin of the name of Central Park's Sheep Meadow.

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While the Sheep Meadow itself hasn't changed much, the animals inhabiting it sure have.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Happy birthday Central Park.
We are lucky.

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[TLOZ Link5]

Happy 400th post, Zippy!

This thread now celebrates two anniversaries, hehe.

[Fabb]

Annual visitors: 25 million

I expected more.

[ZippyTheChimp]

400! I should shut down the computer and check the family for mileposts.

How do they know it's 25 million? They probably made it up.
They could have said 15 million or 50 million, and I would say, "Yup, sounds about right."

[NYatKNIGHT]

150 years ago all the trees were saplings. Now they have finally matured into what Olmstead and Vaux envisioned, and the park has never looked better.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Except for the rock outcroppings, the terrain is artificial,
yet it looks like it was carved out of what we think Manhattan looked like.

Even in good times, NYC allocates 0.5% of budget to Parks Dept. I think in Paris it's about 8%. Groups like CP Concervancy make all the difference.

[Fabb]

150 years ago all the trees were saplings. Now they have finally matured into what Olmstead and Vaux envisioned, and the park has never looked better.


I agree.
However, not only the trees, but also the magnificent skylines of Central Park West & South, that didn't exist 150 years ago, have an important contribution to the beauty of the park.




(Edited by Fabb at 1:40 pm on April 29, 2003)

[ddny]

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[billyblancoNYC]

King of all Parks... end of story.

[Kris]

The only oasis bordered by a mirage.

[ddny]

New York Times
May 15, 2003
Birth of Central Park Holds Parallels With Ground Zero
By GLENN COLLINS


What vast Manhattan architectural and public works project, the likes of which New York City had never seen before, was begun in a time of economic crisis and changed the city forever?

Hint: Stakeholders ranging from real-estate moguls to state and city politicians exerted intense pressure. Republicans stepped in to bigfoot the process. Initial, ho-hum plans were rejected. In the hard-fought design competition that followed, a showdown led to the choice of the Republicans' favorite. The winning and losing designs were placed on display for all to see. Immediately, then, the winning design was altered by powerful competing interests.

Another hint: Think way before ground zero.

The project was Central Park, and there are many eerie parallels between that effort and the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan. "The creation of Central Park, one of the greatest works of art in America, is an epic story," said Morrison H. Heckscher, Lawrence A. Fleischman chairman of the American Wing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. "And the dynamic hasn't changed all that much through the centuries."

Today the museum is celebrating the 150th anniversary of the park it has inhabited since 1880 with the opening of "Central Park: A Sesquicentennial Celebration." The exhibition, curated by Mr. Heckscher, traces the design and building of the first great public park in America. The show features the original presentation plans and drawings by Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted, who won an 1858 design contest that was curiously echoed in the ground zero competition decided last February.

On July 21, 1853, the State Legislature designated as "a public place" the lands that were to become Central Park, accomplishing the unheard-of removal of 17,000 potential building sites from the real-estate market.

"It's appropriate to celebrate the year of the Legislature's decision rather than, say, the design competition in 1858," said Sara Cedar Miller, the historian and photographer for the Central Park Conservancy, which helped to organize the Met exhibition. "The vision to take so much land for a city park was unprecedented in the history of this country."

The show's 60 original maps, drawings, watercolors, lithographs, engravings, paintings and photographs include rare stereograph views of the park from the museum's collections as well as those of the New York City Municipal Archives, the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation and the New-York Historical Society.

In the exhibit, the genesis of Central Park can be seen in an 8-foot-by-2.5-foot original engraving on heavy paper — decorated with a blue and green wash — of the famous April 1811 commissioners' plan that established the grid pattern for Manhattan. It delineated 12 north-south avenues, 155 east-west streets and a planned public park called the Parade, a 229-acre tract between 23rd Streets and 34th Streets.

As demonstrated by the subsequent 1836 Colton Map (a rare section of an early engraver's test print is on view in the show), the Parade succumbed to real-estate speculation before it could be built. The ensuing clamor for a large public park ended in the election of Mayor Ambrose C. Kingsland, who in 1851 proposed the creation of just such an amenity.

"The rich wanted New York to be a major metropolis, and a park was de rigueur, as in Paris and London," said Ms. Miller, author of "Central Park, an American Masterpiece" (Harry N. Abrams, 2003, $45). "And visionaries saw the park as an outdoor classroom in urban reform. They thought immigrants would witness the fine clothes and the carriages and would want to work hard to be part of the American dream."

In addition, as at ground zero, Mr. Heckscher said, "there certainly was pressure to make a decision on the use of the land."

The city's parks at the time were largely decorous and enclosed, often privately maintained, like Gramercy Park. And although City Hall Park was open to the public, those hungry for nature had to cross the Hudson or head to the dead at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.

The State Legislature finally stepped in to check the corruption of Tammany Hall, Ms. Miller said, and it voted to create a park from 59th to 106th Streets, later expanded to 110th Street in 1863. Many of the great 19th-century public parks of England and France had once been royal hunting grounds given over to the people, "which makes the vote of the Legislature to create a park even more unique," Ms. Miller said.

The Central Park tract was swampy, scrubby, rocky and not easily farmed. Another of the treasures on view is the original 1855 drainage plan of Egbert Ludovicus Viele, who was hired in 1854 to be the park's chief engineer. He had come up with a design that, though lackluster, was at first accepted by park commissioners in 1856. That workmanlike plan — also presented in the exhibition — so appalled Vaux that he politicked to throw the choice open to a competition.

Vaux had been a partner of Andrew Jackson Downing, the nation's foremost landscape gardener, and he entered the competition with Viele's gifted park construction superintendent, Olmsted. After toiling at his day job in the park, Olmsted would travel to the town house of Vaux, helping to design the park during the winter of 1857-58. Their hand-drawn original 11-foot-long-by-3-foot-wide presentation drawing is one of the stars of the exhibition.

Also part of the exhibition are eight of the original 11 presentation boards created by Olmsted and Vaux to hawk their plan. The boards feature black-and-white "before" pictures of the existing parkland, taken by the studio of the photographer Matthew Brady (some possibly by Brady himself), as well as oil renderings of the park that would be, some by Vaux. Alone among all the entries, the Olmsted and Vaux plan (they called it Greensward) called for submerged road cuts, isolating the park from crosstown traffic.

The park, Mr. Heckscher said, "was to be a place for passive entertainment, and for the appreciation of nature — a public living room for people of all classes, who were supposed to be on their best behavior."

In all, there were 33 competing design proposals, compared with seven in the final round at ground zero. In the end, the park battle narrowed down to two plans, as in the recent drawdown between Daniel Libeskind and Rafael Viñoly.

The exhibition presents two new discoveries: the runner-up design in the competition by Samuel J. Gustin, as well as an exuberant original ink-and-watercolor entry by John Rink. They have not been on public display since the competition, and both were discovered by Ms. Miller.

Though the Gustin plan was originally the betting favorite (not unlike the Viñoly plan after a key planning committee supported it at the 11th hour in the February ground-zero smackdown with Mr. Libeskind), the Republican-backed Greensward plan was victorious. The final 1858 commissioners' tally presaged the vote in 2003, when Republican Gov. George E. Pataki threw his weight behind the Libeskind design.

Shortly after it was accepted, the Greensward plan was modified to accommodate wealthy New Yorkers' demand for carriage drives and riding trails, adding to the pedestrian paths originally envisioned. An attempt to shrink the size of the park was beaten back by Mayor Fernando Wood, "which was the best thing — and possibly the only good thing — he ever did," Ms. Miller said, noting that Wood was an otherwise undistinguished politician. In the end, admirers of Central Park inspired the movement for state and national parks. And, even then, imitation was the sincerest form of flattery. "Every city in the country," Ms. Miller said, "wanted its own Central Park."



(Edited by ddny at 11:48 am on May 15, 2003)

[ZippyTheChimp]

Going to the Zoo
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[Kris]

That's great art!

[ny patrick]

those were great pictures, i have always dreamed about skiing in the park

[Kris]

Eulogy: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/23/arts/23MUSC.html

Events: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/23/arts/23BPARK.html

[ZippyTheChimp]

June 1, 2003

Central Park's Golden Age

If a well-tended park can bring to mind the gaudy spring of Shakespeare's sonnet, Central Park summons an epic of Homeric proportions. Taken all at once, it is grand, sweeping, nearly overwhelming. Fortunately, it is also digestible in small, delicious bites.

The park's 150th birthday is this year. It has taken that long to make the park what it is today: a safe retreat where one's only worry is that there's a more beautiful spot elsewhere that one may be missing. On one recent morning at the north end of the park, a black-crowned Night-Heron sat regally on a branch in the Harlem Meer, waiting to pluck lunch from the fish-filled waters. Farther south, a waterfall glistened along a wall of jagged black rock and puddled into the Pond, another serene pool with coves and aquatic grasses, where a resident duck waddled ashore to fetch one of her brood, briefly forcing passers-through to make way for the duckling. In the Ramble and the North Woods, paths slice through thickets of trees and shrubs with a density approaching a subtropical forest's. Ferns sway on hilly terrain.

The 843 acres that make up the nation's best-known municipal park showcase nature at its finest. But except for the naturally formed rock and some of the creatures that inhabit or pass through the park, from 200 species of birds to all kinds of dogs and people, the settings are made or enhanced by man. Away from the obviously manicured greenery of the Great Lawn (created from a drained reservoir in the 1930's), the Sheep Meadow and the elm-lined Mall and Literary Walk, there are places shaped by stealthy engineering. The park's ponds and lakes are carved out by design, the fish they hold selected like tenants in an exclusive co-op. A heron's perch will remain picture-perfect, because it has been anchored at just the right spot. Trees, plants and flowers, seemingly wild, are placed and tended with care. Hidden garden hoses create a waterfall. This is art, the realization of Hudson Valley paintings and imagined Edens. Taken together with its structures and monuments, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art to the Bethesda Terrace, Central Park is an ingenious effort to soothe and inspire 25 million visitors every year.

Park officials date its beginning from July 21, 1853, when state legislators voted to create a public space out of a rocky and swampy plot of land on the edges of 19th-century New York City. Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted provided the blueprint several years later. Their grand vision went beyond the European model, and not only in landscaping. They foresaw that the rich and working classes alike could find solace within its boundaries.

Over the years, the park came to symbolize the ills of the larger city, hitting bottom in the mid-1970's, when it became a repository for graffiti and garbage, thugs and drugs, its gardens and playgrounds in ruins. Resurrection came with the establishment of the Central Park Conservancy in 1980, which did something the city alone could not. The conservancy marshaled the resources of the park's neighbors, raising and spending $300 million to recreate and maintain the park as a model of public-private partnership.

The anniversary will be marked on July 19 with fireworks and concerts. But the real celebrating will be done by the city's lucky residents, as it is every day, on skates and bikes, in sneakers and strollers, or arm-in-arm, soaking up the joys of one of the greatest parks in the world.

Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

[Stern]

CNN:

Central Park: Grand experiment, urban respite

NEW YORK (AP) --Step off Fifth Avenue into Central Park and the temperature can drop five degrees on a steamy summer day. Eyes accustomed to grimy shades of city gray suddenly flood with every tint of green. Breathe deeply: A heady combination of lilac and magnolia overwhelms.

It's a place to scale rocks, to jog, to swim, to fly a kite, to simply read a book. Life in New York would be "impossible" without the park, declares Sarah Elliott, an avid bird watcher who takes visitors through the Ramble, a 38-acre shaded woodland of secluded glades, ragged outcroppings, cascades and a cave.

"There are so many things people worry about in this city," she says. "To step into the park is a reprieve. You become part of Mother Nature's plan."

Many visitors -- including native New Yorkers -- don't realize its scope: 58 miles of pedestrian paths and 150 acres of water. The varied topography includes a few fiercely protected American elms; Harlem Hill, a steep challenge tackled by thousands of bicyclists and runners each year; craggy boulders worthy of any nature-starved rock climber; and natural springs evoking the Catskills and Adirondacks.

There are small glades, quiet coves and a bridle trail around the reservoir; hidden inlets and rustic rowboat landings along the undulating shoreline of the 21-acre, butterfly-shaped lake at Bethesda Terrace. Flat, wide-open stretches of lawn dwarf those of almost any college campus.

People even fish on the Harlem Meer.

Yet, for all of its lush 843 acres, Central Park is a manmade oasis. The vision of designers Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, it was born 150 years ago when the New York State Legislature set aside land for the nation's first major public park.

Birthday celebrations
This year, theater, music, dance and sports mark a year of birthday celebrations. Two museum exhibits commemorate its sesquicentennial. The original plans and drawings of the "Greensward Plan" submitted by Olmsted and Vaux are at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Central Park in Blue," at the Museum of the City of New York, highlights newly discovered blueprints by landscape architect Augustus Hepp. A new book, "Central Park, an American Masterpiece," details the park's extraordinary history.

There is much to celebrate. Central Park is almost restored to its original splendor and drawing 25 million people annually, a leap from the days when a fiscal crisis rendered it little more than an ugly wild patch on the urban landscape.

The story began between 1853 and 1856, when city commissioners paid more than $5 million for a rectangle of undeveloped land running from 59th Street to 106th Street between Fifth and Eighth avenues. In 1858, Olmsted and Vaux won a competition to design the space.

Ten million cartloads of soil were brought in to fill a landscape consisting mostly of swamps and 450-million-year-old bedrock that was moved or blasted with gunpowder. An underground drainage system was installed to create ponds and lakes.

"They look like they're natural, but they're run by the city water system," says Sara Cedar Miller, the Central Park historian and photographer of "Central Park, an American Masterpiece."

"The landscape was redesigned and reconfigured to look natural, but it's anything but natural," she says, calling it all a "marriage of aesthetics and engineering."

Egalitarian vision
That natural look came at great cost -- 16 years of labor and $14 million for land and construction. (By comparison, the United States purchased Alaska for $9 million a few years later.)

And there was a human cost, too. Although Manhattan was largely undeveloped above 38th Street, more than 1,600 people were displaced to make way. Most were poor shanty dwellers but New York City's first significant community of property-owning black Americans, called Seneca Village, also was uprooted. The Croton Reservoir now floods that territory.

A Catholic school and convent were forced to relocate, too, becoming a residence for Olmsted and Vaux during the park's development. Two bone-boiling factories were closed, one on a site where the world-famous Tavern on the Green restaurant now serves a Dijon mustard, herb-crusted lamb for $36.

But if the poor were displaced to make way for Central Park, Olmsted and Vaux had an egalitarian vision -- a park entirely for public use, for both rich and poor.

"It was the greatest social democratic experiment of the 19th century, and every city in the nation wanted a public park like Central Park," Cedar Miller says. Cities such as Albany and Buffalo in New York state, Louisville, Kentucky, Montreal, Canada, Boston, Massachusetts, and San Francisco, California, all asked Olmsted and Vaux to design parks.

At the time, the need to escape the ills of urban life were great. New York City was a place "with horse manure covering everything, pollution worse than anything we have today ... the poor houses, the bad ventilation. Infant mortality was at its peak. So people came to the park because many of them were living in unhealthy conditions," Cedar Mills says.

Olmsted and Vaux believed "that nature brought everyone together," and that a public park "would soothe tensions," Cedar Mills adds.

Soothing oasis
The park still serves that purpose.

"It's our oasis from all this," says Bobbe Schwartz, gesturing toward the skyscrapers beyond the park walls as she walks her King Charles spaniel along a winding path near "Maine Memorial," a grand monument commemorating the sinking of the USS Maine during the Spanish-American War. "It's such a genteel place."

It hasn't always been. During the fiscal crisis of the mid-1970s, the trees and gardens were untended, statues defaced, benches broken, bridges and other structures covered in graffiti. Most of the meadows and lawns turned to dust.

The park's reputation also has been marred by high-profile crimes, most notably the 1989 "wilding" attacks by gangs of youths against park-goers. A female investment banker was beaten and raped in the infamous "Central Park jogger" case that year.

"It was meant to be an oasis, a place to get away from it all, from the horrors of the city," says Cedar Mills. "And so whenever something bad happens there, people jump on it."

But today, under the stewardship of a private-public partnership formed 23 years ago, the park has the lowest crime rate of any precinct in the city. That partnership, the Central Park Conservancy, reinvigorated things and now offers an example to cities nationwide seeking to provide and maintain a natural respite amid urban bustle. The conservancy launched a massive restoration with $300 million in private and public donations to repair damage and neglect.

The conservancy restored the park's 55-acre Great Lawn "from a total dust ball to the beautiful lawn that you see today," says Regina Peruggi, the current president. By day, thousands use it as a ball field. During summer evenings, some 60,000 people crowd onto blankets and squish next to picnic baskets listening to the Metropolitan Opera or New York Philharmonic. Diana Ross, Elton John and Simon and Garfunkel also have entertained there.

Along with upgrades to playgrounds, fountains and statues, the conservancy dredged the Harlem Meer, an 11-acre lake in the northernmost part of the park. Now, its banks are draped with healthy willow boughs, the shores traced with wide paved paths that are clean and smooth enough for inline skating.

Peruggi says about $50 million of capital work still needs to be done. Major projects include the Bethesda Terrace lake, which will be dredged and its shoreline newly planted, and the 20-acre East Meadow on the northern end of the park, which will be restored from a dirt ball to a rolling meadow.

A model park
Other cities are again looking to Central Park, this time as a model to restore their parks.

Despite the unfinished work, the park is in a celebratory mood and ready for the millions of visitors to discover its secrets and wildlife: coyotes and a 2-foot caiman (a South American creature that resembles a crocodile) have been spotted, not to mention the pesky and ubiquitous Norway rat, raccoons and 215 species of birds.

"These birds come in, and they're looking down and see a sea of cement and then, suddenly, there's this great green rectangle, so they drop in," says Elliott, the park bird watcher who writes and illustrates a bimonthly newsletter. "They need water, food and rest, and they can get it all there."

Species rare to the area include the peregrine falcon, the orchard oriole and the warbler. Common loons and red-throated loons love the Central Park Reservoir, where they have 106 acres "to run like mad in order to get aloft," she says.

This summer they will be surrounded by the park's 150th celebration -- classical theater, music and dance performances under the sky -- and a big, all-day birthday bash July 19 featuring a bike race, archery championships and Andrea Bocelli in concert on the Great Lawn.

Cedar Miller calls Central Park "a work of art."

"It's an American icon, as great as the Statue of Liberty," she says.

[Edward]

Text from http://www.centralparknyc.org/virtualpark/thegreatlawn/hernshead/

Hernshead is a miniature woodland landscape overlooking the Lake. The name "Hernshead" was derived from the shape of the prominent bedrock outcrop that punctuates the end of this small peninsula. To Olmsted and Vaux, its shape resembled the head of a heron ("hern" in its British translation). Olmsted lavished horticultural attention on this site, first with a grove of London plane trees and then with a variety of herbaceous plants and shrubs. Spring is Hernshead's season with blooming azaleas, Virginia bluebells, Dutchman's breeches, and daffodils. Violets add diminutive dots of color amid the unfurling fern fronds. Most striking of all, in late June, is the copse of flowering white mountain laurel – a rare sight in Central Park.

A narrow pathway through the woods ends at a filigreed cast iron structure called "The Ladies Pavilion." Located earlier at Columbus Circle on the site of the Maine Monument to serve as a bus shelter, it was moved to Hernshead sometime after 1912. Like many of the Victorian vintage structures in the Park, it has elaborate ornamental detailing requiring consistent maintenance; the good news is that restoration is in the works with plans for ongoing care. The Ladies Pavilion provides a "time past" setting for admiring the vista of the Lake.



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[ZippyTheChimp]

Central Park cityscapes - the San Remo

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[Kris]

June 29, 2003

Reservoir's Sunken Fountain Is Rising From the Deep

By KELLY CROW

The Central Park reservoir of has rarely been accused of flashiness. Most days, the 106-acre body of water is glassy calm or quietly rippled. Do not be deceived, though. Hidden beneath the reservoir's surface is a 35-foot-tall wooden platform built in 1917 that looks like an oil derrick and supports a nearly forgotten fountain.

Early this month, the city decided to resurrect the fountain as part of its celebration of the park's 150th anniversary on July 19. The fountain is actually a row of five nozzles that, once renovated, will spray up to 60 feet in the air. The spray will probably be illuminated at night by red, white and blue lights.

"Fountains are a great way to enliven a spot, and this one will certainly surprise New Yorkers who think they know the reservoir well," said Chris Ward, commissioner of the Department of Environmental Protection, which oversees the city's water supply.

The fountain first spouted on Oct. 12, 1917, during dedication ceremonies for the city's First Water Tunnel, which helped supply New Yorkers with fresh water from upstate. But the city soon turned it off because strong winds blew water from the plume onto too many well-dressed walkers along the reservoir's southern edge.

The fountain sat unused for almost 80 years, until the city began making plans in 1998 to celebrate construction of the Third Water Tunnel, which passes beneath the park. City planners discovered old photographs of the fountain and hired divers to investigate. Sure enough, the fountain nozzles were rusty, but the original platform was still in place. The city spent about $50,000 to renovate it.

Problem was, a drought began in the city that year. Only months after coming back, the fountain was shut off.

The city's reservoirs are brimming, so chances are good that the fountain will last at least until winter, when all city fountains are usually turned off. And the park reservoir, now named for Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, has plenty of water to supply the fountain because it no longer feeds into the city's water system, he said. About $5,000 will be spent this time to ready it by July 19, including temporarily lowering the water level for maintainance.

But, common sentiment aside, not everyone loves a fountain. Joan Schumacher, an Upper East Sider who likes to run around the reservoir, said the fountain's spray might mar the reflections of nearby apartment towers.

"I like the natural, mirror quality of the reservoir right now," she said, "and I don't think it's worth it to keep a fountain in the middle. Maybe other people thought so, too, and that's why we really buried it in the first place."


Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

[ZippyTheChimp]

On the subject of the Reservoir, if you hate that view-busting chain link fence, good news. From a sign posted by the CP Conservancy:

...But the panorama has been obscured ever since the low ornamental fence was replaced with a high chain link version
in 1926.

A $2 million project is now underway to restore the historic fence. Made of steel with cast iron ornamentation, it will closely resemble the original fence that surrounded the 1.58 mile perimeter of the Reservoir. The restored fence will be four feet-8 inches above the running track - which exceeds city and state safety requirements. Magnificent views of the Park and surrounding skyline will be much enhanced.

Runners and walkers will be directed to the adjacent bridle path while sections of the running track are temporarily closed for construction.

Estimated completion of construction is fall 2003.

[ZippyTheChimp]

At the recently renovated Pool, a white egret - the only bird that poses.

Looks like a Japanese woodblock.
http://www.pbase.com/image/18551155.jpg


http://www.pbase.com/image/18551189.jpg

[ZippyTheChimp]

Men & Machines
http://www.pbase.com/image/19039291.jpg

Giant ducklings attack US Navy cruiser.
It's on the internet, so it must be true.
http://www.pbase.com/image/19039010.jpg

[Gulcrapek]

That looks like a destroyer. Ducklings would never fight a cruiser. They're not stupid, you know.

[Kris]

I must be, because I don't know the difference.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I think Gulcrapek has been reading Jane's.

I know it's a cruiser. I saw the captain. He had a hat.
USS Ticonderoga CG47.

The Mother of all Ducks was close by ready to pounce on the warship.

[NYatKNIGHT]

Saw Elvis Costello on Friday night in Central Park's Summerstage. What a great place for a concert! Small, intimate and surrounded by trees.

[Kris]

July 19, 2003

Fountain Revived for Central Park's 150th

By PATRICK HEALY

It was a rare sight: plumes of water shooting 60 feet into the air yesterday from a fountain in the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir. Though the submerged fountain was built in 1917, this was only the third time it had been turned on.

But the joggers and power walkers who circled the reservoir in Central Park yesterday seemed unimpressed by the spray. Maybe the rubber tubing that buoyed the pipes put them off, but many said it lacked the grandeur of the Bethesda Fountain, 10 blocks to the south.

Not to worry. Turning on the reservoir fountain around 6:15 a.m. yesterday was only a starting pistol of sorts for the daylong party today to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Central Park. A century and a half ago this Monday, New York State claimed the land that was to become Central Park.

So today the park will brim with concentrating croquet players, instrument-playing police officers and loping mimes. And the reservoir fountain will still be gushing.

"It wasn't long ago that Central Park was an embarrassment, a national symbol of municipal failure," said Adrian Benepe, the city parks commissioner, referring to the years the park was neglected. "The odds were so stacked against it. Things were so bad. Now, it's a national symbol of municipal success."

But back to that fountain.

"It's a fairly average fountain," said Chevaun Stapleton, 20, of Sydney, Australia, as she strolled through the park with her brother and sister. They concurred.

"It's just water spitting up in the air," said the sister, Therese, 18. "I guess it adds something, but . . ."

"Not really," said brother Nick, 16.

Built to commemorate the Central Park reservoir, the fountain has had a tenuous life. It was shut down the year it was built after New Yorkers complained about being hit by the spray. Then after it was reactivated in 1998, the city again shut it off to conserve water during the parched years afterward.

Despite a rainy June, the fountain is operating only for the park's 150th anniversary. The spray will stop in another couple of months, said Christopher O. Ward, the city's commissioner of environmental protection.

A host of other activities and events will also fill the park today.

The athletic can learn lawn bowling and croquet at the Sheep Meadow or can join the New York Road Runners for a four-mile run/walk.

The Urban Park Rangers will give a historical tour, and a mock Revolutionary War encampment will be set up at the Great Hill.

And for the wistful, mimes, jugglers and magicians will circulate through the park.


Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

[Kris]

http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/2003/07/19/nyregion/centralparkbig.jpg
The fountain in the Central Park reservoir was turned on yesterday for the third time in the park's 150 year history.

Schedule of Events (http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/19/nyregion/19CLIS.html)

[NYatKNIGHT]

8/23
The new fence:
http://galleries.soaringtowers.org/albums/NYatKNIGHT/fence.sized.jpg
http://galleries.soaringtowers.org/albums/NYatKNIGHT/sign.sized.jpg

The new fence will encircle The Reservoir
http://galleries.soaringtowers.org/albums/NYatKNIGHT/reservoir.sized.jpg

More Central Park: Belvedere Castle and the Turtle Pond

http://galleries.soaringtowers.org/albums/NYatKNIGHT/Belvedere_Castle.sized.jpg

The Lake in August
http://galleries.soaringtowers.org/albums/NYatKNIGHT/The_Lake.sized.jpg

From the outfield on the Great Lawn:
http://galleries.soaringtowers.org/albums/NYatKNIGHT/Centerfield.sized.jpg

[billyblancoNYC]

Amazing.

[ddny]

It is great that they are replacing the ugly chain fence unworthy of Central Park.

[Kris]

They are likely spending a lot of extra money to ensure the relative fidelity of their historicist re-creation. I would have preferred a contemporary design, of course, but the consensus seems to be that Central Park must at all costs keep its original look, almost 150 years old.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Completed section of Reservoir fence, Oct 28:
http://www.pbase.com/image/22762288.jpg

[Kris]

Soothing view. I see they're still spouting water.

[TLOZ Link5]

That looks wonderful.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Autumn Splendor (http://www.pbase.com/zippythechimp/cp_autumn)

[Gulcrapek]

Too pretty :?

[TLOZ Link5]

Too pretty :?

No such thing.

[Kris]

Central Park at 150 (http://thecityreview.com/cpark.html)

[sunfly]

:P
Great pictures !
Greatest park !
Best wishes for the next 150 !
Happy birthday from Germany !
Not too late i hope :wink:

[ZippyTheChimp]

Sheep Meadow Panorama (http://www.pbase.com/image/32892576/original)

[fioco]

Impressive! Exceptional clarity and (pre-protest calm).

[NYatKNIGHT]

Yes, gorgeous photo! You don't often see sunshine on the north side of those buildings, nor an empty sheep meadow.

[yyy]

Nice photos. I searched for those using the forum search but couldn't find that thread :)

[ZippyTheChimp]

October 31, 2004

Taking the Drive Out of Central Park

By JOSEPH BERGER

Almost four decades ago, city leaders forced the drivers who use the looping Central Park roadway to start sharing it with joggers and cyclists, first on weekends and later during the week as well. Now the joggers and cyclists are getting closer to having the road all to themselves.

Two recent traffic studies show that the number of cars that use the six-mile roadway has been diminishing - by at least 25 percent since 1991 - as the city has blocked entrances to the road and reduced the hours that taxis and cars can use it. One study by the Regional Plan Association has indicated that shutting down the roadway would not significantly increase traffic on major avenues outside the park, as some have ominously predicted.

Discussions are under way among New York City park and transportation officials about a trial starting as early as this spring in which three more vehicular entrances to the park would be blocked off and cars barred entirely between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m., except for the four transverses that cross the park. That would give trees a 12-hour break from fumes and add some car-free running time for late-night and early-rising joggers. The plan still requires the approval of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.

Nevertheless, the discussions suggest how far the pendulum, nudged by environmental and recreational pressures, has swung in two generations. The roadway that once helped speed taxis bearing East Siders and West Siders to and from their jobs, shops or the theaters in Midtown is increasingly yielding to joggers and bicyclists.

Any further closings are sure to anger the city's taxi industry, whose drivers rely on the loop as a shortcut around avenues like Fifth Avenue and Central Park West that are jammed during the rush. A majority of the cars that use the park road are taxis.

"In New York, time is money," said Mahmood Ahmed, a Pakistani immigrant who has been driving a cab for 15 years. "You waste time, you make less money. Everybody likes to fly."

But joggers, many of them training for the New York City Marathon a week from today, were delighted at the news. Andrea Achelis, who works for a jewelry designer, was running last Thursday in a sweatsuit near the southern end of the park shortly after the park roadway was closed at 10 a.m. The late October sunlight was slanting through the park's yellow and russet foliage.

"I try to wait until late so I don't have to jog with all the fumes," she said. "It's nice now. There are no fumes, it's quiet, and you can connect with nature. You can really enjoy the park."

Warner Johnston, a spokesman for the parks department, and Tom Cocola, a spokesman for the Department of Transportation, issued a statement Friday saying only that "several options to improve vehicular conditions in the park have been considered and continue to be considered."

Douglas Blonsky, president of the Central Park Conservancy, the private organization that manages the park under a city contract, said, "If a study supports that we can have some reduction of vehicular traffic in the park, I think that's terrific."

The talks among city officials do not touch upon the transverses that cross the park at 65th, 79th, 86th and 97th Streets, which carry significant volumes of cross-town traffic. Rather, they focus on the six-mile serpentine roadway built 150 years ago for carriages and designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux as a way of bringing the gentry in touch with the masses.

By the mid-1960's, pressure from environmentalists and groups representing runners and cyclists closed the park to cars on weekends; in following years, the drive was also closed to cars at certain weekday times. Currently, the park is closed to cars all weekend and from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. weekdays. A weekday exception is made for the branch of roadway that connects the entrance at Sixth Avenue and Central Park South to the one at East 72nd Street and Fifth Avenue; it remains open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

City officials have resisted shutting the park completely to cars, fearing that congestion on nearby avenues could create more pollution than a car ban would prevent. But in the past two decades, the Department of Parks and Recreation has closed off entrances to the roadway at West 110th Street, West 106th Street and Columbus Circle. Among the gateways now under consideration for closings are those at East 102nd Street, East 90th Street (except for exiting cars), and an exit ramp that runs from West 74th Street to West 72nd Street.

In recent years, joggers and cyclists have each had half a lane to the left of the two traffic lanes, though they have often complained that the strip is too narrow, causing them to bump into one another or stray perilously into the car lanes.

Transportation advocacy groups like the Regional Plan Association and Transportation Alternatives, as well as cycling and jogging clubs, have been pushing for a car-free park. Last Tuesday night more than 700 people packed the Unitarian Universalist Church on Central Park West to rally for that goal.

"We have lots of support from runners who want to use the park during the early-morning hours and health advocates for the children who can use the park after school and have nowhere else to go," said Paul Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives.

A study for that organization and the Regional Plan Association by Jeffrey M. Zupan, a senior fellow of the association, tried to refute claims by opponents that closing the park loop permanently would clog adjacent avenues.

Mr. Zupan argued that as drivers and even taxi passengers become discouraged by the inability to use the loop, many might switch to mass transit. But even if there was no "disappearance," Mr. Zupan said, closing the most-used exit - the one that allows 1,457 southbound cars, or 24 per minute, to spill onto Seventh Avenue and into Midtown during a peak morning hour - would add at most only 4 more vehicles per minute to Fifth Avenue, which now has 33 cars per minute, and fewer to other southbound avenues. Traffic might also be eased by the absence of cars making turns into or out of the park, he said.

Another study of the Central Park roadway several months ago whose contents were made known to The New York Times found that simply closing more entrances would reduce traffic. The study counted the cars entering the park at eight gateways between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. and found that at some, the volume was more than 50 percent lower than it was during a comparable study done for the city's Transportation Department in 1991. On average, the combined decline at all eight gateways was 26.2 percent.

Michael Woloz, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Taxi Board of Trade, which represents fleet owners, said his members and drivers would be upset by further closings.

"They have a shortcut mentality,'' he said, "and if you take away a shortcut, you're going to get resistance and complaints from the driver community."

Even some joggers are not unalloyed supporters of a car-free park. Richard Edwards, a 48-year-old art dealer who was running Thursday with his wire fox terriers, Max and Emma, said that as a jogger he would appreciate less access for cars. But as a traveling businessman who likes to return quickly to his home on Central Park South, "it's much easier going through the park when you're coming from La Guardia Airport."

"So I see the benefits of both," he said.


Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company


A few years ago in an article about efforts to close the park to traffic, it was mentioned that the Central Park Conservancy was curiously neutral on this issue.

The banning of traffic would not eliminate the roadway, which would still be open for maintenance and emergency vehicles, but the roadway could be re-lined to separate cyclists and pedestrians.

It's obvious to anyone who has used the park regularly for more than a decade that traffic has been reduced considerably.

It's hard to visualize now, but there was once an entrance road at Columbus Circle.

Traffic in the park disrupts the experience, and I think those two fellas would be perplexed if they were here to see it.

[Edward]

Bethesda Terrace (http://www.wirednewyork.com/parks/central_park/central_park_bethesda.htm) - 31 October 2004.

http://www.wirednewyork.com/parks/central_park/bethesda/bethesda_terrace.jpg (http://www.wirednewyork.com/parks/central_park/central_park_bethesda.htm)

[ZippyTheChimp]

NYC.gov (http://www.nyc.gov/portal/index.jsp?pageID=nyc_home)

DOT and Parks to Increase Car Free Hours in Central Park; and Introduce New Hov 2+ Plan as Part of Holiday Traffic Plan

Sunday, November 21, 2004
Release #04-138

The New York City Departments of Transportation and Parks & Recreation announced today a series of steps the City will take to increase recreational use of Central Park. These steps include reducing the speed limit on Park drives, permanently closing a number of entrances and exits and reducing the number of hours the Park is open to vehicles. The changes will be phased in during the next few weeks, with full implementation expected by Monday, January 3, 2005, once the City's holiday traffic plan is no longer in effect. Also as part of the holiday plan, for the first time, a High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) restriction will be in effect during the morning rush hour on the Park's West Drive.

Vehicles will now only be allowed on the Park's East and West drives between the hours of 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. As part of this initiative, Central Park will be closed to motor vehicles during the overnight hours from 7pm to 7am and will remain closed between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. As a result, early morning recreational users will have the exclusive use of the drives to themselves. The overnight closures will begin on Monday, January 3, 2005. Also, the speed limit on the Park drives has now been lowered to 25 mph from 30 mph.

In addition DOT and Parks & Recreation will be closing a number of exits and entrances to vehicular traffic, including:

-West 90th Street entrance and exit;
-West 77th Street entrance;
-East 102nd Street entrance and exit;
-East 90th Street entrance; and
-West 72nd Street slip-off ramp at Strawberry Fields.


These closures will improve overall traffic flow within the Park, minimize potential pedestrian/vehicle conflicts, and make available additional space for non-vehicular uses. All closures are expected to be in place by Monday, November 29, 2004.

In addition on November 29, DOT will implement an HOV 2+ Program along the West Drive (between the Lenox Avenue entrance and the Seventh Avenue exit) during the morning (7am to 10am) peak period. By requiring motorists to have at least one other passenger, the HOV 2+ program will encourage car-pooling and reduce congestion and vehicle volumes. During the restricted hours, only vehicles with two or more occupants will be permitted to enter the Park's West Drive.

On November 29, as in previous years, the Central Park holiday traffic plan will be in effect. Weekday road closures, from 10am to 3pm and 7pm to 10pm will be suspended until the New Year.

"The new Park Drive hours, coupled with the reduced number of entries into and exits from the park, will make Central Park even more of a haven from the bustle of urban life," said Commissioner Benepe. "We are pleased to be working with the Department of Transportation and Central Park Conservancy to build upon our past successes in enhancing the recreational use of the park."

"We believe these changes will help create a better balance between recreational and motorized uses of Central Park," said DOT Commissioner Iris Weinshall. "Our new HOV initiative will encourage car-pooling and reduce congestion, and we are pleased to include it in our holiday traffic plan."

"Any opportunity to implement an initiative that makes the Park safer for the public and increases recreational use benefits Central Park and all of its users," said Doug Blonsky, President of the Central Park Conservancy and Central Park Administrator.

[mr. big]

The East side of the park has a different feel than the West side to me. They are both representative of the neighborhoods.

[Kris]

March 6, 2005

F.Y.I.

Park Predecessors

By MICHAEL POLLAK (http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=MICHAEL%20POLLAK&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=MICHAEL%20POLLAK&inline=nyt-per)

Q. When I was visiting "The Gates," I got to wondering: Are there any structures in Central Park older than the park itself?

A. There are two. One is the Arsenal Building, at 64th Street and Fifth Avenue, which is now the headquarters of the city's Parks and Recreation Department. It was built between 1847 and 1851 by the state as a repository for munitions. In 1857, shortly before work on Central Park began, the city bought the Arsenal and removed all arms. It later served as a police station, a natural history museum and a menagerie, among other functions.

The other building is the Blockhouse, near the park's northern end. It was built hurriedly in 1814 after the British stormed Stonington, Conn., in the War of 1812, and New Yorkers suddenly realized that an attack could come from the east or north. The British never attacked. In peacetime the Blockhouse was used to store ammunition. By the time this area of the park was designed, it was treated as a picturesque ruin.

E-mail: fyi@nytimes.com (fyi@nytimes.com)

Copyright 2005 (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) The New York Times Company (http://www.nytco.com/)

[Hof]

The National Geographic's February issue(I believe)has an interesting article about Frederick Law Olmstead and the numerous parks he designed.
While his masterpiece is Central Park(or,as some could argue quite effectively,Brooklyn's Prospect Park),he also created a number of equally stunning parks in other cities,notably the Rochester Parks system,Buffalo's grand parks and parkways,Boston's outstanding green spaces,and urban parks in cities far from the Eastern Seaboard,like Milwaukee and Louisville.
I grew up in Rochester,and came to realize at a very young age how special the parks in that city were.Olmstead-and sometimes collaberator Calvert Vaux-worked the same type of magic on Durand-Eastman's expanse as they did in New York,creating a lakeside park that becomes heavily sculpted,rocky and wooded as you move away from the shore,and with Cobb's Hill Park,site of Rochester's old municipal reservoir and one of the highest points within city limits.
He laid out Highland Park,with it's crystal Arboretum,as a formal garden open to the masses,and today it is home to the spectacular Lilac Festival,a stunningly beautiful celebration of Springtime.
The City's marvelous Seneca Park,located in and along 3-4 miles of a deep gorge carved by the Genesee River north of Downtown,contains Rochester's zoo and miles of steep,wooded trails.
Olmstead's landscapes may all be marvelous fakes,mimicing the natural environs they replaced,but each one I've visited is a jewel,a real urban asset.
Lucky is the city that is fortunate enough to host his work.

[NYatKNIGHT]

Keeping Great Crowds Off Central Park's Great Lawn

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2005/04/27/nyregion/park.583.fr.jpg

Francesca Keeler, 5, seemed to have Central Park's Great Lawn to herself Tuesday.

By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS (http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=TIMOTHY WILLIAMS&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=TIMOTHY WILLIAMS&inline=nyt-per)

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/misc/spacer.gif
April 27, 2005



http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/dropcap/t.gifhe city's Parks Department wants to limit gatherings on the Great Lawn in Central Park to 50,000 people, a move that would end an era in which hundreds of thousands of people turned to the park as a place to protest, or to see the pope, Pavarotti and Simon and Garfunkel, officials said yesterday.

The proposal, which has not been widely disseminated and requires no other approval but the department's, would also cap the number of events on the Great Lawn to six each year, with four of those reserved for the annual performances of the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Philharmonic. Parks officials say those musical programs draw "passive" audiences who go easy on the lawn's Kentucky bluegrass.

The other two events would have to be held during a four-week period in August and September.

The Parks Department said the rules would simply formalize what has been its informal policy since 1997, when the city spent $18.2 million to restore the 13-acre Great Lawn, which for years had been more dust bowl than lawn.

But Adrian Benepe, the parks commissioner, acknowledged that he was led to formalize the rules by the city's court battle last summer with an antiwar group that sought to use the lawn for a rally that was expected to draw as many as 250,000 people.

"You have two choices," Mr. Benepe said. "You can have unlimited, large-scale events, or you can have nice grass, but you can't have both.

"It was unlimited use that destroyed the park in the old days, so if you want the city's backyard to be in good shape, you have got to put limitations on its use," the commissioner said.

Opponents of the policy, however, say something is lost if Luciano Pavarotti cannot sing before a half-million people in the park as he did in 1993, or the pope can no longer celebrate Mass for 125,000, as John Paul II did in 1995.


"We've got to make sure, that No. 1, the limits are for the greater good and not meant to deter certain groups," said Councilwoman Helen Foster, chairwoman of the City Council's Parks and Recreation Committee. "We've got to make sure that we are not limiting what we expose New York City residents to."

The Parks Department published its proposed new rules on April 18 in The City Record, a daily publication in which city agencies announce public hearings. The policy change would not require the approval of the Council, although the department has scheduled a public hearing on the issue for May 20 at the Chelsea Recreation Center.

Currently, the Parks Department does not expressly limit the number of people allowed on the Great Lawn for gatherings, and there are no limits on the number of events held there. Permission to assemble is granted case by case when groups apply for permits. Any group with more than 20 people requires a permit.

The Great Lawn is the only spot in the park where gatherings of more than 50,000 people have been permitted in recent years. A concert by the Philharmonic or an opera performance draws a maximum of about 50,000, representatives from the organizations said; the last big event on the lawn, a 2003 concert by the Dave Matthews Band, drew 80,000.

The new policy would limit events on the lawn to a four-week period from the third week of August through the second week of September, with the exception of the opera and Philharmonic performances, which are held annually in June and July. Mr. Benepe said the monthlong window for new events was intended to give the grass a chance to recover between big gatherings.

A spokesman for United for Peace and Justice, which lost its fight with the city last August to hold a huge antiwar rally on the Great Lawn during the Republican National Convention, said the proposed rules were aimed squarely at preventing groups like his from holding large political demonstrations in the park.

"This would set in stone their institutional attitude about protests," said the spokesman, Bill Dobbs. "In Manhattan, nearly every square foot is covered with buildings, so the park is the town common, where people have assembled for generations. Now the Bloomberg administration is seeking to maintain it as a lawn museum."

The group has received a permit for a May 1 rally at the Heckscher Ballfields in the park to support global nuclear disarmament and end the war in Iraq. Mr. Dobbs said that as many as 50,000 people were expected to attend the protest. The fields are scheduled to be restored this fall, and after that large gatherings there would be prohibited, parks officials said.

Mr. Dobbs said it was particularly unfair that so many of the large-scale events on the Great Lawn would be opera and Philharmonic performances. "To give the symphony and opera four of the six - the bulk of them - shows the class of people whose interests are being protected," he said.

But the city makes distinctions between what it calls passive users (those who sit, drink wine and listen) and active users (those who dance, march or simply stand on the park's delicate grass).

Mr. Benepe said that while classical-music lovers have caused almost no harm to the Great Lawn over the years, the Dave Matthews concert caused $120,000 worth of damage to the grass.

"The day of the mega-event is over in Central Park," said Mr. Benepe, who added that the Matthews concert had taught him a lesson.

In the park yesterday, the proposed changes received a mixed reaction.

Morgan Storms, 26, a fifth grade teacher, said the rules did not make much sense.

"It seems awfully silly to base a law like that on grass that will grow back," said Ms. Storms. "It's like cutting your hair. It grows back, right?"

But Gavin Keeler, 42, a legal assistant playing soccer with his two young daughters, remembered the bad old days, when a walk across the Great Lawn sometimes meant a face full of dust.

"If it's a question between six events a year that are not going to harm it, and a couple of free-for-alls that are going to harm it, I'll take the limits," he said.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2005/04/27/nyregion/pope.184.1.650.jpg

Pope John Paul II celebrated Mass for 125,000 people on the Great Lawn in 1995. Events of that size would no longer be allowed under new rules.

Copyright 2005 (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) The New York Times Company (http://www.nytco.com/)

[TLOZ Link5]

They've got to be kidding. First the Republican Convention, now this.

[ryan]

Seems like the national mall in washington survives alright. The city definitely needs a large-scale public space.

[pianoman11686]

I've actually been to the National Mall in Washington recently and I can tell you that there is hardly any grass there, especially following a big event. Mostly dirt and random patches of bad grass. Definitely not something I'd like see happen to the Great Lawn. Then again, I still think the occasional big event won't damage it that much.

[ZippyTheChimp]

"It seems awfully silly to base a law like that on grass that will grow back," said Ms. Storms. "It's like cutting your hair. It grows back, right?"


May 2, 2005

METRO MATTERS

Saying No to 250,000 on the Lawn

By JOYCE PURNICK (http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=JOYCE PURNICK&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=JOYCE PURNICK&inline=nyt-per)


http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/dropcap/t.gifWO years ago in late September, the Dave Matthews Band held a successful concert on Central Park's Great Lawn that drew more than 80,000 fans.

But park records show that the Great Lawn was damaged by those fans, who stood on their feet, danced in place and surged forward, compacting the grass. Six of the lawn's softball fields needed repair, at a cost of $130,000.

The money was no problem, since the concert's organizers had posted a bond. But while two of the damaged fields reopened to limited use in three weeks, the four others were closed for the rest of the season and through the winter. Doug Blonsky, president of the Central Park Conservancy, said on Friday that if the concert had taken place earlier in the year, "six of the lawn's eight softball fields would have been closed for the season."

And so - the newly proposed policy of the Department of Parks and Recreation: Only six large events will be allowed each season on the Great Lawn, including two free concerts each by the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Philharmonic, and a maximum of 50,000 people at any of those. That means that the Simon and Garfunkel concerts, papal masses and political protests that drew as many as a half-million people to the park are history.

This plan has not gone down well, especially since the Department of Parks and Recreation whispered its proposal by publishing it in The City Record, a dry daily for municipal legal-type notices. That put the department and its commissioner, Adrian Benepe, on the defensive when the news got out. Public relations 101, anyone?

But the proposal, which has drawn objections from some elected officials and protest organizers, would not have won universal acceptance no matter how it was announced.

This is New York. A choice between a green lawn or mass popular entertainment? Between softball or the exercise of free speech?

New Yorkers want it all. But as in other realms, maybe they cannot have it all, at least not in the same location.

Last summer, a protest against the Republican National Convention became a march in city streets rather than a rally on the Great Lawn because - to much criticism, some in this space - the Bloomberg administration would not let the protesters onto the lawn.

This summer, Billy Graham wanted to hold his three-day New York crusade on the Great Lawn. The Parks Department offered Flushing Meadows Park instead, and that's where it will be next month - in Queens.

Central Park is the city's backyard, but, as in other matters (think stadium) one does have to wonder why everything has to be in Manhattan.

THE city started to get fussy about the Great Lawn after its $18.2 million restoration in 1997. The lawn - a defunct section of the park reservoir - was landfill before that, claylike dirt from excavation for the Empire State Building and other projects. It was a dust bowl on some days, basins of puddles on others.

It wasn't maintained well - maybe it couldn't be - and protests, concerts and "happenings" were commonplace. Then came the restoration, with its drainage and irrigation system and carpet of Kentucky bluegrass.

Isn't grass just grass, and doesn't grass always grow back?

Not necessarily, said A. Martin Petrovic, professor of turfgrass science at Cornell University's Horticulture Department.

Dr. Petrovic, a consultant on the lawn's restoration, explained that when blades of grass are destroyed, they will generally come back, but more severe damage can kill the plant's roots.

"It's the degree of damage," Dr. Petrovic said in an interview. "I've been in demonstrations and to rock concerts - people's feet are moving around; they can't stand still." The restored lawn, he continued, cannot tolerate the sustained weight of 250,000 people.

If the grass's roots go, the area needs resodding, and it can take two months for the sod's roots to knit into the soil below.

There are options. Lawns like those on professional baseball fields recover from damage quickly, but require intensive, and costly, maintenance. And platforming - installing temporary plastic grates over the lawn to disperse the weight -could work, Dr. Petrovic suggested. But it, too, is very expensive.

Those or other alternatives will inevitably be raised at a public hearing on the proposal later this month. Or maybe New Yorkers will have to accept that they truly cannot always have it all.


Copyright 2005 (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) The New York Times Company (http://www.nytco.com/)

[Edward]

New Yorkers sunbathing in Sheep Meadow (http://www.wirednewyork.com/parks/central_park/sheep_meadow.htm). 4 July 2005.

http://www.wirednewyork.com/parks/central_park/sheep_meadow/sheep_meadow_4july05.jpg (http://www.wirednewyork.com/parks/central_park/sheep_meadow.htm)

[lofter1]

Looking for photos, drawings, etc. of the on-going Heckscher Playground renovation.

Here's info from Landmark's Prevervation Commission website, regarding the proposal that was the basis for the current renovation:

Decision - Advisory Report for Central Park, Manhattan Docket 03-6167

THE NEW YORK CITY LANDMARKS PRESERVATION COMMISSION

1 CENTRE STREET 9TH FLOOR NORTH NEW YORK NY 10007
TEL: 212 669-7700
FAX: 212 669-7780

ISSUE DATE:06/03/2003
DOCKET #:03-6167
CRA #:CRA 03-7411
BOROUGH:MANHATTAN
BLOCK/LOT:1111/1

This report is issued pursuant to Sections 3020 and 854 (h) of the New York City Charter and Section 25-318 of the Administrative Code of the City of New York, which require a report from the Landmarks Preservation Commission for certain plans for the construction, reconstruction, alteration, or demolition of any improvement or proposed improvement which is owned by the City or is to be constructed upon property owned by the City and is or is to be located on a landmark site or in a historic district or which contains an interior landmark.

The Landmarks Preservation Commission, at the Public Meeting of June 3, 2003, following the Public Hearing of the same date, voted to issue a favorable report with certain reservations for a preliminary design for the alteration of the landscape surrounding the Historic Playground, at the southwest corner of Central Park, as put forward in your application completed on May 1, 2003.

The proposal, as approved, consists of the reconfiguration and realignment of existing paths, the reconstruction of drainage systems, the installation of plantings, the restoration of the Heckscher Building as the primary entrance to the playground, the installation of fencing, the installation of a soft surface play area in the center of the playground, the restoration of the ball fields, the installation of a wooden pergola with seating wall, the installation of new benches, the creation of a picnic area, the restoration of the Adventure style Playgrounds, and the replacement of some playground equipment; as described in the Project Advisory dated March 2003, photographs, and drawings labeled The Historic Playground Landscape, The Historic Playground Landscape Existing Conditions, The Historic Playground Landscape Landscape Analysis, all prepared by the Central Park Conservancy, submitted as components of the application, and presented at the Public Hearing and the Public Meeting.

In reviewing this proposal, the Commission noted that the designation report for the Central Park Scenic Landmark describes Central Park as an English Romantic style public park designed in 1856 by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. The Commission also noted that the area known as the Historic Playground is approximately 30 acres; that it was originally designed in 1858 as recreation grounds for a variety of field games for children; that it was modified as the Hechsher Playground in 1926 to become the first permanent play space in Central Park designed exclusively for children, including a wading pool, state of the art play equipment, and a recreation building. In 1936, the Playground was overhauled, the wading pool redone, hard asphalt was introduced, the pavilion building was doubled in size, and the open meadow was converted to formal ball fields. Also in the ‘30s, the Spur Rock Arch in the southern end of the site was demolished and a portion of the bridle path was removed. The Playground was again modified with the introduction of a toddler Adventure style playground in 1969, and in 1972, the wading pool was converted to an Adventure water playground.

With regard to this proposal, the Commission found that the realignment of paths and the elimination of desire lines will create a logical circulation system, will renovate the drainage system, will create fresh areas of greenery, and will be consistent with the general design conception of the park; that the reconstruction of paths and landscapes will utilize standard park materials and site features; that the work will bring the northern portion of the site closer to its original design; that the termination of the bridle path south of Pinebank Arch will not damage or alter any historic path; that the introduction of a picnic area with wood chip ground cover, split rail fence and wooden picnic benches will harmonize with the landscape; that the the proposed modifications to the pavilion building will bring it closer to its orignal appearance; that relocating the main entrance to the playground through the altered pavilion will return this feature to its original purpose; that the introduction of a pergola with seating wall overlooking a soft surface play area in the center of the Playground will eliminate a large swath of barren concrete and will return the Playground to a condition more in keeping with its original intent; that the restoration and modification of the existing playgrounds within the historic Playground landscape will return these amenities to first class working order; that the restoration of the Adventure water play area will reestablish a feature which existed as a water play area since the 1920s; and the cumulative effect of this proposal will enhance the special character of the Central Park Scenic Landmark. Based on these findings, the Commission determined the proposed work to be appropriate and voted to issue a positive report, with certain qualifications.

However, in voting to approve this work, the Commission required that the Central Park Conservancy reconsider the use of artificial turf at the center of the playground, and if possible, substitute a natural soft surface material. The Commission also required that the details for the termination of the bridle path, the removal of certain desire lines, and the design of the fencing return to the Commission for review upon further design development.

This permit is issued on the basis of the building and site conditions described in the application and disclosed during the review process. By accepting this permit, the applicant agrees to notify the Commission if the actual building or site conditions vary or if original or historic building fabric is discovered. The Commission reserves the right to amend or revoke this permit, upon written notice to the applicant, in the event that the actual building or site conditions are materially different from those described in the application or disclosed during the review process.

All approved drawings are marked approved by the Commission with a perforated seal indicating the date of approval. The work is limited to what is contained in the perforated documents. Other work or amendments to this filing must be reviewed and approved separately. The applicant is hereby put on notice that performing or maintaining any work not explicitly authorized by this permit may make the applicant liable for criminal and/or civil penalties, including imprisonment and fines. This report constitutes the permit; a copy must be prominently displayed at the site while work is in progress. Please direct inquiries to Providencia Velazquez.

Robert B. Tierney
Chair

cc: Douglas Blonsky, Central Park; Ed Benson, Central Park Conservancy; Caroline Kane Levy, Deputy Director, LPC; Deborah Bershad, Art Commission

Issued: 6/3/03
DOCKET: 03-6167

[BigMac]

New York Sun
February 23, 2006

Central Park's Constant Gardener

Lunch at the Four Seasons

By PRANAY GUPTE - Special to the Sun

Douglas Blonsky is Central Park's constant gardener.

"That's some job," the New Jersey-born administrator of the 147-year-old park said yesterday. "All day, every day."

It means working with 250 full-time staffers and 3,000 volunteers. It means raising much of the park's annual $25 million budget. It means nurturing a vast cohort of donors - not only the big-money kind, some of whose families have been involved with the park for several generations, but also 20,000 New Yorkers who pay between $35 and $1,000 a year for the privilege of being formal supporters of Central Park.

It means dealing with 25 million visitors annually who use Central Park's 50 entrances to stroll, jog, romance, and gambol in an area that is 2 1/2 miles long and half a mile wide. It means supervising more than 1,000 public events, ranging from performances of the Metropolitan Opera to the New York City Marathon.

"It means being the human face of the park," Mr. Blonsky said, with a smile that suggested advanced enthusiasm.

Mr. Blonsky's job actually consists of two assignments: In addition to being administrator, he is president of the not-for-profit organization that manages Central Park under a contract with the city, the Central Park Conservancy.

The words "job" and "assignments," however, don't quite capture what it is Mr. Blonsky does.

Consider this: He is the supernumerary of an 843-acre park with 26,000 trees of 165 different species, including 4,262 Black Cherry, all self-seeded, none planted; 1,834 American Elms, one of the finest collections in America; 1,318 London Planes; 1,724 Pin Oaks; 1,632 Black Locust; 1,310 Norway Maple; 953 Sycamore Maple; 757 Red Oak; 549 Ginkgo, and 407 Turkey Oak.

When one counts Central Park's 4 million shrubs, lawns, and hedges, that's another 1,500 species of flora under Mr. Blonsky's care as Central Park's constant gardener. And there are 275 species of migratory birds that inhabit the park, which is on the Atlantic Flyway.

"Constant gardener" may not even capture the essence of his contribution to the park since he joined the conservancy 21 years ago. Although he blanches at the seemingly hyperbolic characterization, a more appropriate term would be "savior."

When Mr. Blonsky came to New York, armed with a bachelor's degree in landscape architecture from Rutgers University and another bachelor's degree in horticulture from the University of Delaware, Central Park was a mess. Virtually all of its structures, including Belvedere Castle, had been defaced by graffiti. Its 9,000 benches - which, if placed end to end, would run seven miles - were dilapidated. Its 36 bridges and arches were falling apart. Its seven ornamental fountains and 120 drinking basins were crumbling. Muggings were commonplace, even in daylight. The 6-foot-deep lake at 72nd Street was filled with detritus. The blue grass had withered, and the lawns were parched.

"I was amazed that the park was in such poor condition," Mr. Blonsky said.

His distress was heightened by the fact that Central Park had its own folklore and its own special place in the life of New York City.

Growing up in Morristown, N.J., as the son of a MetLife employee, George Blonsky, and his wife, Kathryn, a Spanish-language teacher, Mr. Blonsky had always been encouraged to be outdoors. Douglas, the youngest of four children, helped out in his parents' garden, where roses and rhododendrons were in abundance. Central Park was a metaphor for an advanced urban civilization and a great city's lungs.

By the time Mr. Blonsky came to New York, he was familiar with the park's history. The city had commissioned the designer and writer Frederick Law Olmsted and the English architect Calvert Vaux to create Central Park out of a vast area of scrubland, swamps, boulders, and some farmland. Some $5 million had been allocated for the project, which involved bringing in 10 million cartloads of soil and seedlings. By 1873, Central Park was completed.

By 1980, however, it had deteriorated to the point where nothing short of a master plan was needed to rehabilitate it.

"All that history, all that wonderful greenery - Central Park had been taken for granted," Mr. Blonsky said. "Our master plan was more than a rescue operation. It was total rehabilitation."

Over the next 25 years, some $320 million was raised for the project from the private sector. One of Mr. Blonsky's acclaimed innovations was to create 49 "zones" for the park. Each zone would have a multidisciplinary team attached to it, and the team would be responsible for its upkeep.

Spurred by the conservancy's 52-member board, Mr. Blonsky and his associates introduced what were then considered technological novelties such as walkie-talkies. Vehicles were bought that could easily access all parts of the uneven terrain. Mr. Blonsky's wife, Mai Allen, a landscape architect and former Parks employee - whom he met in Central Park - was often a source of design ideas.

With the assistance of allies such as Betsy Barlow Rogers, Ira Millstein, Norma Dana, and Richard Gilder, among others, the conservancy's endowment rose to more than $100 million.

New York being New York, of course, a public-service enterprise rarely can escape politics, especially a highly visible, iconic presence such as Central Park. So how was Mr. Blonsky to effect his innovations without suffering political interference?

"Well, it helped that I was an outsider to the city," he said. "Some of our donors and board members handled the political part."A former Parks commissioner, Henry Stern, "a political animal if ever there was one, was a wonderful ally," he said.

"I also received great cooperation from various mayors, especially Mayor Bloomberg, and his Parks commissioner - and my good friend - Adrian Benepe. My message always was, 'It's everybody's park.' It's hard for people to be partisan over Central Park - passionate, yes, but partisan? No."

In the spirit of such nonpartisanship, Mr. Blonsky hopes to be able to create a special high school that will inculcate in students a love for the landscape.

"Central Park's presence in New York's life is forever assured," Mr. Blonsky said. "But wouldn't it be nice if we trained young people to look after the city's great asset?"

© 2006 The New York Sun, One SL, LLC.

[ablarc]

Fill in all but a small portion of the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir. It's not much of an asset as it is.

[lofter1]

Whaaaaaaa ??? ^^

Big asset for the birds ;)

[ablarc]

There's still Harlem Meer and several other lakes, all of which have much better shorelines for birds.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Whoa! Can't do that, ablarc.

The Reservoir is on standby, but still part of the city water supply. In one of the stages of a drought emergency, I think just before the Chelsea Pumping Station draws water out of the Hudson, it is brought back into service.

At present, the Reservoir water is used to maintain water levels in the Pool, Meer, etc.

If you run on the Reservoir track, you know how much the water cools the surrounding area.

[ablarc]

Sure, and those fairly modest functions can probably be taken up by newly-built facilities elsewhere outside the city. It would take money and the will, but what doesn't?

[ZippyTheChimp]

As per a 1997 agreement, the city is already expanding water supply facilities upstate. Removing the Reservoir, which is probably the easiest water source to control, would needlessly take a billion gallons out of the system. A waste of money.

I don't know how you would cool the park from outside the city.

[ablarc]

Well, just a suggestion for how to have both a lawn and a gathering place for half-a-million...

Everyone's got their priorities. Some folks want their lawn, some want their gatherings, some want their park cooler by a degree or two, some want lower taxes, on and on...

Can't please everybody.

[lofter1]

The renovated Heckscher Playground has re-opened and it's beauty ...

New benches, great rubberized asphalt around the play areas and under the climbing structures, huge sand pit with new swings, and other great amenities.

Some of he plantings around the perimeter as well as the pergola have yet to be finished.

Should be a fun summer!

[Kris]

May 7, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
Close the Loop
By KENNETH M. COUGHLIN

THIS Tuesday, the New York City Council has scheduled a hearing on proposed legislation that would end motor vehicle traffic within Central Park — for the summer, at least — and it's about time.

New York City, like many urban areas, sacrificed much during the 20th century to make way for the automobile. Expressways destroyed thriving neighborhoods. Streets were widened, sidewalks steadily narrowed, and the playground was born as a substitute to what had been children's natural play space: the street outside their homes. But of all the sacrifices to suit the needs of automobiles and their drivers, few have been more incongruous than the invasion of that most hallowed of public spaces, New York's Central Park.

In the 1850's when a design contest was held for Central Park, one of the requirements was the inclusion of at least four public streets that traversed the park. Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux won the competition in large part because of their ingenious scheme for meeting that requirement in a design that created the illusion of countryside within the city.

As Olmsted's biographer, Witold Rybczynski, tells us, Central Park's architects knew that "city traffic would have been a noisy and dangerous intrusion and would have destroyed the effect of country scenery," so they placed the four required public streets in large excavated trenches, eight feet below ground, creating what we now call the transverses.

Olmsted and Vaux also created a winding, bucolic carriage road that was as vital to the overall feel of the park as its lakes, woods and verdant expanses. But they had no idea that with the coming of the automobile, their pastoral drive would be transformed into a crowded, noisy thoroughfare. Soon after automobiles gained access to the north-south carriage road in 1899, the park essentially became a convenient shortcut to Midtown.

Today, those who come to Central Park seeking a refuge from the city to walk, run, cycle or skate on the park's loop road find themselves restricted to a narrow lane during prime recreational hours. With the constant jockeying for position that occurs among the lane's users, collisions between users or with cars that edge into the lanes are frequent.

Over the last few decades, as the recreational use of Central Park's loop road has boomed, public officials have been slowly returning it to the city dwellers for whom it was intended. Car-free hours have been increased and some vehicle entrances closed. But in a city of constant traffic, noise and toxic emissions, it is a shame that our elected officials haven't let Central Park be one area where their constituents can get away from it all.

The legislation that will be heard this week to ban vehicles during the summer, when traffic is lightest, is a step in the right direction, but ideally, the Central Park loop should be closed to cars all year round. Those who object to this idea claim that it will worsen congestion on surrounding streets. But that's not true.

In fact, closing the park to cars should alleviate the city's congestion woes because of what traffic researchers call "shrinkage." Right now, the Central Park loop is an enticement to drive to Midtown. If the loop were closed for a sustained period, experts predict, the traffic would shrink. According to the Regional Plan Association, closing the loop would eventually induce 20 percent to 60 percent of the drivers who now use the park to switch to other transportation or significantly modify their driving patterns.

In 2001, Mayor Michael Bloomberg campaigned on a platform of reducing private automobile use. He should acknowledge that closing Central Park's loop is one painless way to accomplish this by supporting the legislation and even calling for a year-round ban. Yes, a few drivers will be inconvenienced and may well have to consider alternatives like mass transit, but isn't that good public policy? Moreover, ridding Central Park of traffic would be an important symbol to the rest of the country and the world that New Yorkers are willing to place sensible limits on the use of cars.

New Yorkers owe an incalculable debt to the people who ran our city in the mid-19th century. When they carved out and carefully designed great tracts of open land amid a growing and bustling city, they understood that every resident, rich or poor, young or old, needed an occasional respite from the unremitting din of urban life. Central Park is a glorious example of this enterprise. But sadly, we have squandered this gift by allowing it to do double duty as a traffic artery. It is now up to us to reclaim that gift.

Kenneth M. Coughlin is a board member of Transportation Alternatives, a cycling, walking and public transit advocacy group.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

[ablarc]

^ Hear, hear!

[ZippyTheChimp]

Spring at the Conservatory Garden
http://img146.imageshack.us/img146/8086/convgarden012kt.th.jpg (http://img146.imageshack.us/my.php?image=convgarden012kt.jpg)

[Kris]

July 16, 2006
Central Park
Restoring Vaux’s Vision, One Tile at a Time
By JAKE MOONEY

OF the joggers, stroller-pushers and tourists who passed the Bethesda Fountain on Central Park’s 72nd Street Drive on a humid morning last week, few noticed all the activity going on just below their feet, in the cavernous sandstone passage known as the Bethesda Terrace Arcade.

Of course, there hadn’t been much to notice in the space since 1984, when workers removed the nearly 16,000 intricately patterned clay tiles from the ceiling, directly under the transverse, for restoration.

The tiles, which were designed in part by Calvert Vaux, were in worse shape than anyone had thought, and the Central Park Conservancy, the nonprofit group that manages the park, lacked the money to restore them. The 49 ceiling panels, which were completed in 1868 and were part of the original park plan, went into storage, where most of them stayed for 20 years.

The conservancy restored and remounted two of the panels in 1998, and in 2002, Evelyn West, a Brooklyn Heights resident with a longstanding interest in historic preservation, bequeathed $3.5 million to the conservancy to finish the job. Now, workers have added new waterproofing to the roof and are hanging three more of the restored one-ton panels this month for inspection by city agencies.

Meanwhile, conservancy technicians are working in a shed and a trailer in the park just north of the Ramble, inspecting each tile, with an array of cleaning fluids, paints and putties at the ready. The restored arcade should be open to the public by the end of the year.

“It’s a rare thing to be able to say you’re doing a preservation undertaking of this magnitude — and we’re doing it right here in the park,” Douglas Blonsky, the conservancy president, said last week.

In the trailer, one technician, Elizabeth Saetta, said the hardest tiles to clean were those stained with rust from the roadway supports — removing the rust can take a month. Fixing a chip with putty can take two or three days. On average, the restoration team has cleaned four 324-tile panels a month; because some tiles, handmade in England by the Minton Company, are damaged beyond repair, the ceiling will include several panels of new tiles made with the same techniques.

In general, though, the original roof is in good shape. “It lasted 140, 150 years — that ain’t bad,” Mr. Blonsky said, “considering there was a lot of water, a lot of salt, a wet location that never dried out.”

James Reed, the project’s director, named another hazard that has been an inescapable part of Central Park life: “Kids throwing Spaldeen balls against it.”

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

[milleniumcab]

May 7, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
Close the Loop
By KENNETH M. COUGHLIN

THIS Tuesday, the New York City Council has scheduled a hearing on proposed legislation that would end motor vehicle traffic within Central Park — for the summer, at least — and it's about time..


The City's refusal to deal with the vehicular traffic issue, while taking roads away by closing the park loop, creating more bike lanes, etc. etc., is totally outragous...:mad:

[ablarc]

^ Greatest good of the greatest number.

[milleniumcab]

Eliminating some of the cars coming in to the business district would be the greatest of all greatest goods, for all New Yorkers.. But that's not politically correct..:(.. Closing the Central Park to vehicles is..

[ablarc]

Eliminating some of the cars coming in to the business district would be the greatest of all greatest goods, for all New Yorkers.. But that's not politically correct..:(.. Closing the Central Park to vehicles is..
Both would be best of all. I'm all for congestion charging. Would make it easier for cabbies, for sure.

[lofter1]

But would it ^^ stop them from honking their horns at whim?

[ablarc]

That's for strict enforcement of the noise ordinance.

[milleniumcab]

oooooooo, that stereotyping... it can be amusing, that's for sure..:D :D :D

[virtualchoirboy]

I took these on Saturday. Alot of wedding parties end up here for thier pictures. This is Central Park East @106 (Vanderbilt Gate).
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/th_SoBro029.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/SoBro029.jpg)
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/th_SoBro026.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/SoBro026.jpg)
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/th_SoBro021.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/SoBro021.jpg)

I snapped these driving down Central Park East.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/th_SoBro035.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/SoBro035.jpg)

Not many people know that the grand French Renaisance-style chateau on the southeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 79th Street is actually open to the public. Built for a businessman and art collector named Isaac D. Fletcher in 1899, and later home to oil millionaire and scandal-ridden Harry F. Sinclair as well as Augustus Van Horn Stuyvesant (descendant of Peter Stuyvesant, the colonial director famous for his $24 deal with Manhattan's Native Americans), this mansion was purchased by the Ukranian Institute in 1955.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/th_SoBro034.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/SoBro034.jpg)
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/th_SoBro033.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y41/virtualchoirboy/SoBro033.jpg)

[ablarc]

Wow, beautiful pictures of a little-known part of the park.

There were French style townhouses like that on Fifth Avenue opposite the Met, where Philip Johnson put that stupid, jokey apartment building with the ostentatiously propped-up mansard facade element.

[ZippyTheChimp]

A quiet spot near a busy bridge.

http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/1913/gapstow30qc6.th.jpg (http://img112.imageshack.us/my.php?image=gapstow30qc6.jpg)

[ZippyTheChimp]

Earlier this year, plans were announced for capital projects to renovate areas of the park over the next seven years.

Over the course of the next seven years, the Conservancy will be breaking ground on multiple projects in two key areas of the Park. One focus will be on the landscapes, bridges, structures, and shoreline of the Lake. The remaining projects will include the landscapes and playgrounds on the stretch of parkland that extends along the east side from the Metropolitan Museum to the Harlem Meer. Many of the restorations will re-establish lost “Olmstedian” views and re-create rustic structures and bridges not seen since the Park’s early years. Whenever possible the Conservancy’s landscape architecture team has stayed true to or evoked the spirit of the 1858 Greensward Plan of Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux for Central Park. The restoration of the 22-acre Lake, located in the heart of the lower Park (West 72nd-78th Streets), will be completed in two-and-a-half years. The restoration of the Lake encompasses several adjacent landscapes and distinctive architectural features. Projects will be done in phases to limit the effect on public use of these areas.

Text (http://www.centralparknyc.org/media/file/CampaignPressRelease.pdf)

Work has begun at Bank Rock Bay.
http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/5615/cpbankrock01cor6.th.jpg (http://img300.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cpbankrock01cor6.jpg)

http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/5448/cpbankrock02cgn1.th.jpg (http://img294.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cpbankrock02cgn1.jpg) http://img247.imageshack.us/img247/9765/cpbankrock03cga5.th.jpg (http://img247.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cpbankrock03cga5.jpg) http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/3110/cpbankrock04cqr8.th.jpg (http://img294.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cpbankrock04cqr8.jpg)

It's a mess, but wildlife likes it just the way it is.
http://img295.imageshack.us/img295/355/bankrock01nv8.th.jpg (http://img295.imageshack.us/my.php?image=bankrock01nv8.jpg)

[meer]

Went for a walk in the park last weekend and found they're doing construction at Bethesda Terrace also. They have areas roped off and all.

Here's a couple from last fall:

http://www.greenfreak.net/greengallery/albums/Travel/central_park/angel_243-3.jpg


http://www.greenfreak.net/greengallery/albums/Travel/central_park/angel_227-2.jpg

[pianoman11686]

Restored Tiles in the Heart of Central Park (http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/nyregion/20070101_BETHESDA_GRAPHIC/)

The Bethesda Terrace is being restored to the vision of Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

[NYatKNIGHT]

Why is this taking so long? It's a tile ceiling. Skyscrapers have been built and the entire George Washington Bridge has been repainted since the $3.5M donation was given to complete this job.

[pianoman11686]

I took a long walk through the park last Saturday. It was about 72 degrees that day, and there were literally thousands of people in the park. It could not have been more perfect.

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary032.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary033.jpg

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http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary041.jpg

[pianoman11686]

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary042.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary043.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary044.jpg

Working on Bestheda Terrace (and yes, it was already late afternoon on a Saturday):

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary045.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary046.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary047.jpg

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http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary051.jpg

[pianoman11686]

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary052.jpg

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http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary061.jpg

[pianoman11686]

Notice the orange cones: a 72 degree-day has a way of making huge puddles in an ice skating rink:

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary062.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary063.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary064.jpg

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary065.jpg

I saw several brides and grooms.

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary040.jpg

Fittingly, there was more than just love blossoming:

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary066.jpg

[antinimby]

Central Park could use more tall evergreens so that it doesn't look so brown and naked during the winter months when the deciduous trees are bare.

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r260/pianoman11686/NewYorkJanuary063.jpg

[MidtownGuy]

Pianoman, thanks for those pictures! I wanted to walk into the Park that day but got sidetracked. That picture with the two people bicycling in shorts says it all. Oh, and the last one, with the Forsythia beginning to bloom.

[Liverpool Alan]

Hi a newbi here all the way from Liverpool UK comming over in feb so i am using your sight as a great fact finder for our trip to Manhatten. Central Park is top of my list as most visitors but a little bit more special for me being from Birkenhead.

http://www.answers.com/topic/birkenhead-park


Birkenhead park is 3 miles from our house and walk it with our family and dog every week. Looking at your pics i will post some of birkenhead park when i work out how to.
Many thanks Alan

[Liverpool Alan]

My spelling is bad tonight sorry. Mind it is 2.25 am g/d-nite

[ZippyTheChimp]

January 23, 2007

In Douglass Tribute, Slave Folklore and Fact Collide

http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2007/01/23/arts/23quilt_lg.jpg
Courtesy of Algernon Miller
An eight-foot-tall sculpture of Frederick Douglass, by the sculptor Gabriel Koren, is included in the $15.5 million project honoring Douglass.

http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2007/01/22/us/23quilt2.jpg


By NOAM COHEN

At the northwest corner of Central Park, construction is under way on Frederick Douglass Circle, a $15.5 million project honoring the escaped slave who became a world-renowned orator and abolitionist.

Beneath an eight-foot-tall sculpture of Douglass, the plans call for a huge quilt in granite, an array of squares, a symbol in each, supposedly part of a secret code sewn into family quilts and used along the Underground Railroad to aid slaves. Two plaques would explain this.

The only problem: According to many prominent historians, the secret code — the subject of a popular book that has been featured on no less a cultural touchstone than “The Oprah Winfrey Show” — never existed. And now the city is reconsidering the inclusion of the plaques, so as not to “publicize spurious history,” Kate D. Levin, the city’s commissioner of cultural affairs, said yesterday.

The plaques may go, but they have spawned an energetic debate about folklore versus fact, and who decides what becomes the lasting historical record.

The memorial’s link between Douglass, who escaped slavery from Baltimore at age 20, and the coded designs has puzzled historians. But what particularly raised the historians’ ire were the two plaques, one naming the code’s symbols and the other explaining that they were used “to indicate the location of safe houses, escape routes and to convey other information vital to a slave’s escape and survival.”

It’s “a myth, bordering on a hoax,” said David Blight, a Yale University historian who has written a book about Douglass and edited his autobiography. “To permanently associate Douglass’s life with this story instead of great, real stories is unfortunate at best.”

The quilt theory was first published in the 1999 book “Hidden in Plain View,” by Jacqueline Tobin, a journalist and college English instructor from Denver, and Raymond Dobard, a quilting and African textiles expert. It was based on the recollections of Ozella McDaniel Williams, a teacher in Los Angeles who became a quiltmaker in Charleston, S.C. “Ozella’s code,” the book says, was handed down from slave times from mother to daughter. Ms. Williams died in 1998.

According to “Hidden in Plain View,” slaves created quilts with codes to advise those fleeing captivity. What looked to the slave master like an abstract panel on a quilt being “aired out” on a porch in fact represented a reminder, say, to be sure to follow a zigzag path to avoid being tracked when escaping. In Ms. Williams’s account, there was a sequence of 10 panels to guide an escaping slave, beginning with a “monkey wrench” pattern meaning to gather up tools and supplies and concluding with