Central Park It is one of the most famous parks in the world: located in the Manhattan district a New York Between the Hudson River and the East River, he has an area of Ben 3.41 km2. Inside there are tens of km of pedestrian and cycle paths, as well as lakes, museums, zoo, concert rooms and much more. In short, it is one of the most important attractions of the Big Apple … even if not everyone knows that until a few decades ago in this same area there were only houses and the park was built at the table after having demolished entire residential neighborhoods. Manhattan public park rocks
As Central Park is done and what’s inside
As anticipated, Central Park is located in the heart of New York, between the Hudson River and the East River. The park measures about 4 km long For 800 meters width and has an overall surface of 3.41 km2. To get an idea, it is more than the surface of the Principality of Munich and the Vatican city put together, but – small curiosity – at the same time is about half of the park of the Villa Reale of Monza.
Inside the park there are more than 93 km of pedestrian paths, although it is interesting that in the past not everyone could be traveled on foot: a part of the routes was actually pedestrian, as today, while other lanes were reserved for horses in the trot and others only only for carriages. It was a way to decrease traffic inconveniences … even if in fact this created a “class” division at the time, with the poor on walking paths and the rich on those on horseback: for this reason too, it was decided to make them all pedestrian and cycle paths.
But Central Park is not just pedestrian paths: there are many inside Points of interest which make it a unique place in the world: I speak for example of the Metropolitan Museum of Artfrom the fountain and of the Bethesda terrace, of the zoo or the numerous lakes made within it. Because yes, the lakes were also made especially for the park, before they did not exist.
The only authentic things of Central Park are … the rocks.
The rocks of the Manhattan public park
These have been there before there was the park, indeed, since before New York existed and, think, they are an age that in some cases comes to 1.1 billion years. Among these are some particularly noteworthy, such as the Rock Vistaon which the Belvedere Castle. Among other things – small anecdote – here they had to initially arise two castles but the funds for the park were finishing, and therefore instead of this second castle to save money, it was decided to make one wooden canopy.
Speaking of funds and projects, I think it’s time to take a leap in time and go to see how the idea of making such a great park was born in the middle of the city.
Central Park’s project in New York
We are all‘beginning of the nineteenth century: The city of New York is rapidly expanding and the classic grid structure that we all know becomes more and more dense. This, as it is easy to guess, prevented the creation of a park worthy of this name. Yes, there were green areas, but they were small sparse scattered here and there. The situation began to change in 1853, when the high offices of the country decided to make a green area For all citizens … but … where would it have been built if the island of Manhattan was almost totally covered with houses?
Simple, some neighborhoods went demolished. The main area involved in this maxi-demolition of the demolition would have been the one between the 59th and 106th roadthus including the Seneca Village. The Seneca Village was a community where many ex-shifts lived and worked. Let’s remember that we are in the mid -nineteenth century, and the end of slavery had been decreed for a few years.
At the time, the government had the authority to be able to expropriation houses of private individuals if certain public works had to be carried out, but to avoid passing as “domineering”, they decided to implement a defamatory strategy against the inhabitants of the Seneca Village: through newspapers and public statements, it was tried to leverage the latent racism of the New York of those years, convincing everyone that, perhaps, to demolish that neighborhood, it would have been a good, regardless of the park.
While this campaign was underway, it was decided to call a competition in the New York Times to decide which architect would deal with the project.
The construction of the park
To overcome this announcement it was necessary to present projects that include certain elements, among which we find:
- roads that would allow to cross the park aside;
- a fountain;
- a cricket field;
- an area dedicated to ice skating during the winter;
- A concert hall.
The winning project would have received a budget of 1.5 million dollarswhich today would be equivalent to something like 60 million dollars. Overall were presented 32 different projects. Among these were those who proposed elegant European style gardens, others offered terraces gardens, but in the end on April 28, 1858 the winner was chosen. They were the Greensward Plan, the work of the designers and architects Frederick Law Olmsted And Calvert Vaux. Their idea was very similar to what we see today, therefore a garden totally studied at the table but that would give the feeling of being an almost uncontaminated natural area.
At this point the construction works could start: the Seneca Village And all the houses that returned inside the future park were demolished, forcing 1600 people to be forced – behind a small state compensation deemed insufficient. After razing everything to the ground – with the exception of the base rocks still present today – buildings, planting trees and do everything you need to make the Central Park the place we know today.
