MHC 200: Power of Parks Does Central Park work?

FIELD LAB 2

How did Central Park originally come to exist?

Central Park came into existence with the development of the “greensward plan” by Frederick Law Olmsted and architect Calvert Vaux in 1857. During the mid-nineteenth century, urbanization took a toll on the city with increasing pollution, overcrowding, and social unrest, which fostered the concern of how to improve the bustling city. As a solution, there were demands for a new public space, and people began to advocate for a large park within Manhattan. Early supporters were cultural elitists who sought to create a public space that can compare to those in Europe at that time. Furthermore, parks were regarded as lungs that filtered out the dirt and fumes in the air. Thus, with the “greensward plan,” Central Park would become a park composed of “pastoral landscapes…picturesque designs…and a variety of formal elements” (Gandy, 87).

How has the perceived purpose of the park changed over time?

Drawing on from the Picturesque movement, Olmsted’s idea was in essence to create a pseudo countryside within a city to facilitate social harmony and economic prosperity. He had a universal vision of establishing a “democratic pleasureground,” where all can enjoy its beauty and recreation (Gandy, 98). The park also has a public health purpose, in which the working class can escape the crowded tenement districts, and breathe in fresh air and exercise (Platt, 27). However, the park has fundamentally remained up to this date an elite playground for the upper-middle class. In modern day, it’s also noticeable that the majority of the people in the park are white upper-middle class folks. It was unrealistic how the park was catered to the public sphere because one, the lower class did not really have public transportation to get there, and even if public transportation improved it would have been inconvenient for them, and two, they did not have the time for this kind of leisure. In his plan, Olmsted also rejected the notion of implementing sports facilities in the park, which emphasized the preservation of an aesthetic elitism. The park was never one of public interest, but of Olmsted’s elitist design imposed on society. Today, however, there are several sports facilities where people can run and bicycle, play baseball, and ice-skate. While Central Park had been established due to the social disorder of urbanization, in actual fact, real estate speculation led elites to escape urban life unto the park, which formed a more exclusive space.

How has that feature changed over time?

Central Park Zoo started as a menagerie in the 1860s when people and circuses began donating animals to the city. In 1934, Robert Moses built a newer zoo with nine new buildings made of neo-Georgian brick and limestone, surrounding the sea lion pool in the center. The buildings also had detailed chimneys and sculptures that depicted the animals in a house. Two of the 1934 buildings remain – the birdhouse, now a gift shop, and the monkey house, now a Zoo school. Under the direction of the Wildlife Conservation Society, the zoo was renovated in the 1980s and reopened in 1988. With the new zoo, the traditional cages were now replaced with more natural environments comprised of water, vegetation, and rocks, where animals like polar bears, sea lions, and snow monkeys can rest and conceal.

What does that case tell us about the current concept of parks today?

The original “greensward plan” created by Olmsted and Vaux did not include a zoo, but the zoo slowly grew as a part of the park. In the larger sense, the zoo is emulating a natural environment of animals, within a park that is “seemingly natural.” Without a doubt, Olmsted did not envision a zoo within his ideal of Central Park. He adamantly refused to build sports facilities, no less a zoo. Designing a park has no defined equation, but the demands of the public influence the guidelines of what parks should need and have. This case tells us that the current concept of parks today is more practical and interactive. Parks are public spaces for social gatherings, thus the zoo functions as a fun and educational setting for children to learn about wild animals.

Bibliography:

• Gandy, Matthew. Concrete and Clay: Reworking Nature in New York City. Cambridge Mass. Print.
• Platt, Rutherford H. 1994. The Ecological City. From Commons to Commons: Evolving Concepts of Open Space in North American Cities.
• Scheier, Joan. The Central Park Zoo (Images of America: New York). Web. 19 Sept. 2011. <http://www.cpzbook.com/index.html>.