Prospect Park (Park)
The Prospect Park in New York City District Brooklyn is an establishment opened in 1867, now 2.4 square kilometer park between Park Slope, Prospect Lefferts Gardens, Ditmas Park, Windsor Terrace and Flatbush Avenue, Grand Army Plaza and the Botanical Garden of Brooklyn. It is operated and maintained by NYC Park and is part of the Brooklyn-Queens Greenway. The park was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux after they completed their work on Central Park in Manhattan . It is located on the edge of the district of the same name in central Brooklyn, about 3 km southeast of the historic center of Brooklyn Heights .
The park in the eastern center of Brooklyn is the structural center of the district. The Prospekt Park is the boundary for seven districts that are grouped around it. Going clockwise from north these are: Prospect Heights , Crown Heights , Lefferts Gardens (sometimes referred to as Prospect Lefferts Gardens), Prospect Park South , Windsor Terrace, and Park Slope .
The Grand Army Plaza forms the distinctive entrance to the park in the northwest .
history
In 1776, almost 100 years before the park was built, the Battle of Long Island in the American War of Independence took place on its current site .
The decision to create a large park in Brooklyn was passed on April 18, 1859, whereby a 12-member commission was set up, which was entrusted with the determination of suitable areas as well as planning and construction.
Of the proposed areas, the one with a 1.3 km² park around Mount Prospect was the most ambitious. The design should be based on a plan by landscape architect Egbert Viel. However, the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 interrupted all planning.
Before the implementation of the park construction was continued after the end of the war in 1865, the commission chairman James ST Stranahan had the plans of the landscape architect Calvert Vaux appraised by Egbert Many in order to be able to remedy any deficiencies in the planning.
A few years earlier, Vaux had helped design Central Park in Manhattan . Many found the division of the park by Flatbush Avenue problematic and preferred a contiguous park that could be equipped with a lake in the middle. Vaux's plan changes also included an increase in the parking area. Vaux brought in his Central Park design partner, Frederick Law Olmsted , and they made other changes to the plan. Flatbush Avenue continued to run through the park, but more on the edge and therefore less dividing. A lake was also created, not in the middle, as requested by Vaux, but rather at the southern end of the park. The final draft was submitted and approved in the spring of 1866. Construction work began in June 1866 and the opening took place on October 19, 1867. The park was not finished at this point. The design work was not completed until 1873.
Prospect Park was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 17, 1980 .
From January 2, 2018, the park will be completely and permanently closed to car traffic. In the years before that, some streets in the park had already been closed to cars, and most recently East Drive was allowed to be used during the morning rush hour.
The trees and bushes in the park
Among the native deciduous trees in Prospect Park you will find: American elm , the oak and maple trees , yellow poplar or tulip tree , ash , red mulberry , wild cherry , dogwood , antler tree , sassafras tree and milk orange tree . The American conifers include the white pine , blue spruce , hemlock , and the bald cypress from the southern swamps. On “the inner slopes of Lookout Hill” there was a collection, naturally arranged, of the most delicate shrubs and trees, especially evergreens such as rhododendrons , laurel roses , azaleas and rosemary heather . The shore of the lake was planted in "picturesque groups of evergreen and deciduous trees."
From the very beginning, many plants were introduced to the park from other parts of the world, some of which were gifts. Among the trees in Europe were: the sycamore maple , Norway maple , common lime , oak trees , English elm , elm , English field maple , beech , hornbeam , horse chestnut and Austrian Pine .
As a single tree, the Camperdown elm near the Cleft Ridge arch is the most remarkable example; a mountain elm grafted onto a normal elm resulted in a tree with almost distorted horizontal branches.
Asian trees are the Japanese pagoda tree , ginkgo , sky tree , Chinese elm , Chinese tree lilac and magnolia . Among the oriental evergreens are the Emodi pine , polyhedral pine and the Caucasian spruce .
A tree transport machine was developed in 1867 by consulting engineer John Y. Culyer . It enabled a tree of good size, along with much of the earth around its roots, to stand upright and be moved elsewhere without damage. Numerous trees that were in Long Meadow were removed and replanted elsewhere by this device. In 1872 alone, 284 trees were transplanted in this way .
The park had its own tree nursery which kept an average of 30,000 trees and 25,000 other plants, and in the first two years of Prospect Park construction, over 73,000 trees and shrubs were planted from that stock. However, trees were also imported from other nurseries outside the park that were much larger.
The work began in June 1866 with a crew of 300 men. Although employment fell during the winter months, the number of employees rose to a peak in October 1867 when 1,825 were on the payroll. Then the number ebbed, with an average of about 1,100 employees in the warm months of 1868, then again about 1,000 men in 1869, 750 in 1870 and again to 1,100 in 1871. Decreased due to the depression of 1873 the number of employees is about half that number.
Sights and facilities in the park
The attractions include:
- Brooklyn's only lake, covering 60 acres (24 hectares );
- the Long Meadow, a 90-acre (36 hectare) meadow;
- the picnic house, with offices and a hall that can accommodate up to 175 guests for parties;
- the Litchfield Villa, the pre-existing home of Edwin Clark Litchfield , the former owner of the southern part of the park; the park administration is housed in the villa today;
- the Prospect Park Zoo, with a large nature reserve managed by the Wildlife Conservation Society;
- the boathouse, which houses a visitor center and the first municipal Audubon Center;
- the Prospect Park Bandshell (concert shell), which hosts free outdoor concerts in the summer;
- Sports facilities, including seven baseball fields in Longmeadow, the Prospect Park Tennis Center, basketball courts, soccer fields and the New York Pétanque (boules) -Verein on the Parade Ground.
Prospect Park Alliance
The Prospect Park Alliance was formed in 1987 with the aim of restoring the park after years of budget cuts and a steady decline, both through nature itself and through use, could no longer be overlooked.
The Le Frak family dynasty of real estate agents donated $ 10 million to the park for the renovation of the ice rink, which will be named after Samuel and Ethel LeFrak, the founder's parents. After years of delay, construction costs have risen to $ 74 million and will be funded by a mix of public and private funds. The new Lakeside Center was designed by architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien.
literature
- Louis Harman Peet: Trees and shrubs of Prospect park . Publisher: American Printing House, New York 1902. The book is divided into sectors in which the individual trees and bushes are identified.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Leffert's Garden
- ↑ Brooklyn Botanic Garden
- ↑ Grand Army Plaza - Brooklyn Historic Name: Prospect Park Plaza
- ^ Tree Moving Machine - New York Historical Society-YHS's collection
- ↑ Green-Wood Cemetery Brooklyn - Grave Edwin Clark Litchfield
- ^ New York Petanque Club
- ^ Prospect Park Alliance
- ^ Website of the company
- ^ Prospect Park ice rink
- ^ Lakeside center
Web links
Coordinates: 40 ° 39 ′ 43.6 " N , 73 ° 58 ′ 11.5" W.