The Complexity of Central Park

¶ … telling the story of what has come to be known as Central Park in New York City. Indeed, very few parks in the world are as iconic and story-filled as that park. The words in this report will not just be a recitation of the history of the park. There will also be stories told about the people that planned, envisioned and constructed the site. There will also be some focus on those that have used the park for whatever notable purpose.

This report will very much be an encapsulation of the people that brought Central Park to life and have kept it at the glorious standards that it still meets today. The author of this report will make use of historical and scholarly sources to make the important points to be made. While there are certainly architectural and landscaping marvels, both in the United States and around the world, there are not a lot of areas of the world that are as breathtaking and story-filled as New York's Central Park.

The city of New York and its significance has been known for quite a long time. Indeed, this was figured out and established as far back as 1800. It was clear that its future as a major commercial hub of what is now the northeastern part of the United States was going to be extensive. This was due to things like it's "well-protected and year-round harbor" and its strategic location at the mount of the Hudson River [footnoteRef:1].

As the city began to expand and grow, there was an eventual turn to a green space or park that could be inserted somewhere on the main island of New York. However, there were a lot of twists and turns that happened before the final location and size of the park was settled upon. It was initially settled on that there would be about a dozen north/south streets and that were one hundred feet wide each. There would also be about 155 east/west streets.

About ten percent of those (15) would be the width of the avenues while the others would be narrower. This was done with a purpose as houses and neighborhoods based on right angles are easier to maintain and develop. If the original plan for New York park space, as authored in 1811, had been approved, it would have been massive in addition to being a true "central" park in the area.

The total acreage to be dedicated was about five hundred in total with about 239 acres residing between Twenty-third and Thirty-second Streets and Third and Seventh avenues. This plan was quickly shot down was that the open space was entirely too big for what was desired and sacrificed entirely too much area that could and should be used for commercial development and/or homes for residents. Over the 1810's and 1820's, the city continued to expand at a very rapid pace.

However, people started to complain that the amount of park space was entirely lacking and that this condition should be remediated [footnoteRef:2]. [1: Hecksher, Morrison H. "Creating Central Park, "Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 65, 3 (Winter 2008): 6-74.] [2: Hecksher, Morrison H. "Creating Central Park, "Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 65, 3 (Winter 2008): 6-74.] Part of the demand for parks was resolved by the land donated by Samuel Ruggles that would eventually become Gramercy Park. The Stuyvesant family gave land for a square that would later be named after them.

By 1838, there were about 170 total acres' worth of parks. However, there was a want and desire for more. This is when the two major advocates of what would become Central Park came to the table. Indeed, those two people were William Cullen Bryant and Andrew Jackson. Rather than being politicians, they were instead from the arts and letters sphere. Bryant grew up in Massachusetts and practiced law before moving to the New York area in 1829 to enter the world of newspapers.

He was also a renowned poet and became a highly influential editor for the New York Evening Post. He made his case for a park in 1844 when he wrote an editorial that included a statement that implored the need for "an extensive pleasure ground for shade and recreation." He further said that there was "no finer situation for the public garden of a great city." The latter quotes was a reference to an area known as Jones' Wood.

This was a heavily forested tract of land along the East River [footnoteRef:3]. [3: Hecksher, Morrison H. "Creating Central Park, "Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 65, 3 (Winter 2008): 6-74.] Downing has his own two cents when it came to the need for a bigger and better park. He wrote a series of screeds that mostly focused on a "lament" that there as a stunning lack of parks around the country.

These letters and other offerings continued for about a decade running from 1841's A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, Adopted to North America to some letters he wrote from 1848 to 1951. When the initial plans for the Jones' Wood tract came to pass, the initial indications were encouraging. However, there was soon some major blowback in the form of the Democrats taking over the City Council and a number of lawsuits from landowners that did not want the plan to go forward.

Downing was then drawn to assert in another writing that five hundred acres was the absolute minimum that New York should dedicate to its planned Central Park. Everything finally came to a head when the Central Park Act was passed on July 21st, 1853. This started the process of preparing the area including the acquisition of the land areas involved and so forth. The passage and implementation of this law represented one of the two biggest public works projects to date with the other one being the Croton Aqueduct.

One person that was pivotal to the Central Park coming to pass was a man named Viele. For a time, he was using his spare time to do surveying and other work related to the park and he did this without payment for quite a long time.

Indeed, he was very dedicated to getting the park planned and prepared and he took more than a slight gamble in committing to the project whilst there was still a lot of infighting and squabbling about how the park would evolve and change as it was being planned and built. This squabbling and ambiguity about the park's future finally seemed to subside in April 1857 when the governing structure under which the park would be built was finally completed.

Much of Viele's work before this resolution was eventually rejected but the newly appointed board overseeing the project retained Viele for the work that was to be done now that the governing structure was finalized. Further, a man named Calvert Vaux was to have been part of the project had he not died in 1852 in a steamboat accident. Vaux's view of Viele's plan was not positive and this is probably what led to Viele's plan being disregarded, even if they kept him on as part of the project [footnoteRef:4].

[4: Hecksher, Morrison H. "Creating Central Park, "Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 65, 3 (Winter 2008): 6-74.] Even with Vaux shooting down Viele's prior vision of the park, he still emerged as being one of the two major architects of the park. Viele was a graduate of West Point. After his unpaid stint, which lasted about three years, turned into a chief engineer post, he enlisted four surveyors to complete the job. He divided the area for the park in fifty square foot blocks.

He also commissioned things like geological profiles, drainage schemes and the overall layout of the park which included pathways and so forth with a central parade ground being the overall nexus of the park. This was in part the plan that was rejected. The position of Chief Engineer was eventually claimed by the eventual and final chief of the project and that was a man by the name of Olmsted. There were nearly three dozen (33) entries when it came to the design competition for Central Park.

A dozen of them came from park employees and these included engineers John Rink, Roswell Graves Jr., and George E. Waring. Viele was in the mix as well and he actually resubmitted the same plan that was rejected prior. Olmsted came to power because his vision was the one selected by the commissioners on April 28. Olmsted's proposal is significant because it had significant contributions from the aforementioned Vaux, who has died about four years prior to the plan's acceptance.

The Olmsted/Vaux proposal came to be known as the Greensward plan. The guiding idea behind the Greensward plan was that the park designed was more than just a sum of the parts that made it up. Indeed, there were actually some plans that were quite similar to the Greensward plan. However, the Greensward plan was unique in how adeptly it handled transportation logistics for people moving in and about the park.

Rather than put unsightly roads across the park, they used four transverse roads that were up to eight feet below grade. This way, transportation around the park was still facilitated but the overall aesthetic of the park was not overly affected by the presence of those roads. The plan was for a tract of about 778 acres.

While a lot of the natural curves and features of the geography were maintained, there were also a lot of additions and changes that required a lot of moving of earth including blasting, draining, grinding and planting. Even with the focus away from major streets through the park, a crown jewel of the park, as designed by the people involved, was a rather profound promenade that was purposefully lined with trees. This strip became known as The Mall and its presence and grandeur persists to this very day [footnoteRef:5].

[5: Brown, Jeff L. 2013. "The Making of Central Park." Civil Engineering (08857024) 83, no. 1: 40-43. Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed November 4, 2015).] The progress of the park's construction went on fairly unabated until 1860. There were accusations of improper management that was mainly typified by cost overruns. A full investigation was completed because there were accusations of political favors and other malfeasance. Even so, the investigation eventually exonerated the Board of Commissioners. Despite this, Olmsted was relieved of his duties and a man by the name of Andrew Green took over.

Even with the succession of Olmsted, the park was mostly done and in place and Green was really just there to manage the remainder of the project. Just to give an idea of the scope of what Olmsted had fostered, nearly a quarter million trees and shrubs had been planted as part of what had been done up to that point alone.

The major piece that was left undone was the incorporation of the land in the areas between 106th and 110th street that had been added to the northern edge of the park. This addition brought the total acreage of the park to 843 acres [footnoteRef:6]. [6: Brown, Jeff L. 2013. "The Making of Central Park." Civil Engineering (08857024) 83, no. 1: 40-43. Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed November 4, 2015).] As one can easily see, the men behind Central Park paid a large amount of focus to the foliage and the paths/streets throughout the park.

However, there is one facet of the park and its construction that cannot be left unanalyzed and that would the bridges that pepper the park. Indeed, this was one thing that Vaux and Olmsted paid a great amount of attention to. Many hail the "seamless" way in which the roads and paths progress throughout the park. As partially noted before, the passageways for people are distinctly separated from the transverse roadways that were mentioned before.

The latter, rather than sticking out as a sore thumb, is put below grade as needed so that neither set of roads/pathways is inhibited by the other. Further, Vaux planned for forty different bridges. Every single one of them was unique and served a specific purpose. The one that Vaux held above the others was the Terrace. In modern times, it is known as the Bethesda Terrace. It lies at the northern end of the aforementioned Mall.

The bridge is unique because it elevates a segment of Terrace Drive above a pedestrian plaza. The Upper Terrace, as such, can rightly be considered a bridge. Rather than just being a crossing, however, it is also designed to be an architectural focal point for all of Central Park. There are hidden wrought-iron girders that are two feet deep and they carry the roadway a distance of nearly thirty feet.

In the void beneath the span, an series of seven arches that are adorned with English ceiling tile invites the pedestrians in the area to linger and marvel at the space [footnoteRef:7]. [7: Brown, Jeff L. 2013. "The Bridges of Central Park." Civil Engineering (08857024) 83, no. 2: 38-41. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed November 4, 2015).] When assessing the bridges as a collective group, the building materials involved are quite varied. Indeed, these materials include wood, brick, marble, sandstone and granite.

However, the one material that stands out above the rest of those is the cast iron. Constructed between 1859 and 1875, they are among the very first bridges in the entire United States that were made with that material. The most notable of the bridges constructed as such is the Bow Bridge. It is nearly ninety feet long and it spans a sixty feet neck of the park's largest lake. One park commissioner suggested a suspension bridge in that place but the iron bridge is what eventually made the cut.

Olmsted and Vaux were the ones that pushed the iron bridge instead. They asserted that it would be lighter and less obtrusive than a suspension bridge. The reputable firm by the name of James, Fowler, Kirtland and Company were among those that helped construct the bridge. They are the very same people that erected the iron dome for the United States Capitol. Of course, this gorgeous bridge stands to this very day. One of the original bridges that did not stand the test of time was the Gapstow Bridge.

It was made of wood with cast iron railings. It lasted only a generation and was eventually replaced with a stone arch in 1896. Speaking of arches, another structure in the park that should be pointed to is the Denesmouth Arch. It carries the southernmost transverse road in the park as it crosses a pedestrian path. The structure is more than three dozen feet long and is more than a dozen feet high. It is typified and distinguished by alternating long and short voussoirs. These structures "radiate" outward from the opening.

There are also four posts on its balustrade that once held bronze lamp posts. One of the materials used for this structure was New Brunswick sandstone. This was a personal selection and choice on the part of Vaux when he drew up the plans before his death. That material can also be found on the Dalehead Arch and some smaller crossings including the Glade Arch, Green Gap Arch and the Springbanks Arch [footnoteRef:8]. [8: Brown, Jeff L. 2013. "The Bridges of Central Park." Civil Engineering (08857024) 83, no. 2: 38-41.

Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed November 4, 2015).] It should be specifically noted that the New York Park initiative, as it was called in the 1840's, was the overall genesis of the park movement in the United States and that is indeed the project that led to what is now known as Central Park in New York. This pattern continued starting in the 1880's in the form of what is known as the rus-urban park, that term referring to a park created in an urban setting.

When getting to the Latin root of this terminology, it literally means "country in the city." Indeed, New York City is a very urban area where green patches can be hard to come by. However, everyone has access to and can enjoy Central Park and the park is by no means small in size or hard to traverse even if there are a lot of people present there. However, the message and purpose behind parks like Central Park have a much deeper purpose.

As explained by Eveley, "the park movement can be understood as a reformist project that sought to create a space in which the utopian promise of American democracy, challenged by increasingly apparent class and status hierarchies of mid-ninteenth centur cities, could be fulfilled" [footnoteRef:9]. [9: Evelev, John. "Rus-Urban Imaginings: Literature of the American Park Movement and Representation of Social Space in the Mid-Nineteenth Century," Early American Studies: An interdisciplinary Journal 12, 1 (2014): 174-201.] Beyond the above, the park movement has been a point of a great deal of scholarly analysis over the years.

The disciplines and perspectives from which the park movement have been studied include landscape design, geography, urban planning, social history and art history. The parks themselves and their associated planning/building have obviously been some of the things looked at. However, there have also been assessments of the associated literature. The words of Downing and such are but one example of this. Indeed, there has been a litany of writings that speak about and advocate the building and expansion of parks.

These include newspaper articles, editorials, magazine essays, scholarly addresses and travelogue descriptions of both English and European parks. Even fiction is full of references to parks in terms of setting, daydreams and the like. Eveley points out that while some may be dismissive of the advocates of parks as they existed in the 1840's (e.g. Downing). However, the eventual change that came from Downing and advocates like him is easy to see and is without question. If one needs proof, one can look to the fact.