FUN FACTS – Why Central Park Was Almost Not Central

Here is a fun fact for you, Central Park was not part of the original Commissioner’s Plan of 1811 for the orderly development of land around Manhattan, and if public opinion or administrative decision-making had been slightly different, New York’s largest park may have been on the Upper East Side. By the 1840’s there was a rising call for a great public park by influential New Yorkers like William Cullen Bryant, editor of the Evening Post (now the New York Post). A site called Jones’ Wood on what is now the Lenox Hill and Yorkville neighborhoods, pictured below, was a strong candidate by 1851.

At that time Jones’ Wood, a 150 acre wooded area, was used as an amusement area with beer gardens and dancing for working-class New Yorkers. While City authorities thought it would be an ideal site for a large park, more forward-thinking city planners thought it better to make the park more central to allow for the City’s future northward growth.

Both Jones’ Wood and what is now Central Park were approved for development in 1853, but only Central Park was developed. Jones’ Wood was parceled into residential and commercial areas, and some of the land was destroyed in an 1894 fire. Central Park was completed in 1859.

Images and Source Credit: Ephemeral New York

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