For a majority of visitors from across
New York and the world, Central Park is
memorable for what they find at the
southern end. That’s where the zoo is.
And the carousel. And a pond where hob-
byists launch their radio-guided sail-
boats. And the lake, where couples
launch themselves in rowboats.
The southern part of the park is sur-
rounded by some of the most affluent
neighborhoods in the country and is in
the shadow of “Billionaires’ Row,” where
new condominium towers are strato-
spheric in height and price.
The northern end of the park is a dif-
ferent story. It is surrounded by less af-
fluent blocks filled with largely African-
American and Latino residents, has
fewer must-see gems and draws signifi-
cantly fewer visitors and far less atten-
tion.
That is about to change. The nonprofit
group that manages Central Park is
planning the largest project it has under-
taken in its nearly 40 years: a $110 mil-
lion investment in the mostly forgotten
northern corner, which may not be on
many tourists’ itineraries but which is a
vital backyard to surrounding blocks
where green space is scarce.
The main piece will be replacing the
aging, 1960s-vintage Lasker Pool and
skating rink, just past the Harlem Meer,
the lake created by Frederick Law Olm-
sted and Calvert Vaux in the mid-19th
century.
The project has resurrected questions
about “park equity” and long-running
criticism from advocates who say that as
money continues to pour into New
York’s signature parks, smaller and out-
of-the-way green spaces in modest
neighborhoods remain neglected.
In this case, another big pot of money
is being spent on Central Park, but it is
being directed to a sometimes over-
looked part of the park.
Mayor Bill de Blasio, who called for
improving parks in poor neighborhoods
when he ran for office in 2013, an-
nounced a parks equity plan the follow-
ing year. It has spent $318 million of city
money on 67 parks in low-income areas
that had not seen investment — major
repairs or improvements — in more than
20 years.
The Central Park Conservancy, the
group that manages the park, argues
that the $85 million it spends on the park
every year frees up that much money for
the city’s Department of Parks and Rec-
reation to spend on other parks.
“The whole premise of the park is
about equity,” said Elizabeth W. Smith,
the group’s president and chief execu-
tive. “It was to be a reprieve for every
person to connect with nature, especially
those who are least able to leave the city.”
She said that when the group was
formed — in 1980, after the park’s deteri-
oration in the 1960s and ’70s as the city
declined — work to repair and restore
the northern part of the park “started im-
mediately thereafter, in effect to give the
message that we were going to restore
the whole park.” The ravine, not far from
the pool and the rink, and the North
Meadow were restored relatively re-
cently.
The conservancy’s model, which in-
cludes raising money from donors large
and small, has been followed by otherpark groups like the Prospect Park Alli-
ance in Brooklyn and the Alliance for
Flushing Meadows Corona Park in
Queens.
Some 42 million people visit Central
Park every year. Statistics on who uses
the Lasker rink and pool indicate that it
brings people primarily from nearby
neighborhoods.
About 45 percent of the people who use
the pool come from central and East
Harlem and Manhattan Valley, and 26
percent come from Upper Manhattan
and the Bronx. Another 16 percent live
elsewhere in the city. The rest are vis-
iting New York.
Councilman Mark Levine, who repre-
sents a portion of Upper Manhattan that
includes some neighborhoods around
the park, called the plan “one of the most
important park equity projects” on the
drawing board.
“You have a low-income community of
color north of the park,” he said. “Histori-cally, the wealthier neighborhoods are in
the southern part of the park and that’s
where the money has gone. This rights
that wrong in a really dramatic way.”
Lynn B. Kelly, the executive director of
the advocacy group New Yorkers for
Parks, cheered the plan, noting that the
area north of the park and across 110th
Street is in the City Council district that
has the least parkland of any district in
the city. But it has the most residents
within walking distance of a park.
“To get a brand-new, state-of-the-art
facility is incredibly meaningful,” she
said.
Robert DeCandido, who as “Birding
Bob” leads birding expeditions in Central
Park and conducts scientific research
there, said use of the north end “has
grown exponentially over the last 30
years as I’ve watched it,” and not just
among birders.
Dr. DeCandido said he was concerned
that changes could draw even more peo-ple, which could affect the ambience.
That, in turn, could make the area “less
good for birding.”
The project is being coordinated by
the conservancy, which has raised
nearly $1 billion since it started manag-
ing the park.
Ms. Smith, the conservancy presi-
dent, said the project would not only be
the largest that the group had undertak-
en but also the most complicated. Until
now, the group’s most expensive venture
was the $28 million restoration of the
Lake, the biggest of the park’s naturalis-
tic water bodies other than the reservoir,
from 2007 to 2009.
For the work in the northern end of the
park, the city has budgeted $50 million of
the $110 million total, and the conser-
vancy has already raised $100 million. It
plans to apply the additional $40 million
to an operating fund that will cover year-
round programs that have not been of-
fered there before.
The existing pool and rink have been
open only about nine months a year.
Some 220,000 people swim or skate
there every year.
The pool is operated by the parks de-
partment in the summer. The Trump Or-
ganization has had the concession to run
the skating rink for 32 years; it also op-
erates the Wollman Rink at the other end
of the park. The company’s contract
runs through 2021, the year construction
is set to begin.
If the project is completed on sched-
ule, the new pool will be ready for swim-
mers in spring 2024 and the rink for skat-
ers that fall.
Ms. Smith said the project dated to
2015, when “the city asked if we wanted
to patch and repair” the Lasker com-
plex.
“We said, ‘It’s beyond repair, but if you
want us to take some time to re-envision
it, we’d do that,’ ” she recalled, noting
that the mechanical systems in the pool
have outlived their useful life.
The plan also calls for rerouting a
stream that courses through the area
and has been diverted underground
through a culvert since the 1960s. Skat-
ers will also be able to twirl on a new
boardwalk along the Harlem Meer.
Getting rid of the existing Lasker
complex will mean dismantling its un-
sightly aboveground base, a fortresslike
structure that walls off perhaps the most
inviting way into the park south of 110th
Street.
“It stands in direct opposition to what
the point of the park was as a reprieve in
the city,” said Christopher J. Nolan, the
conservancy’s chief landscape architect
and the Central Park administrator. “It
does not say ‘Welcome.’ ”‘Equity’ for the Northern End of Central Park
KARSTEN MORAN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES JEENAH MOON FOR THE NEW YORK TIMESSOUTHSheep Meadow, where “Billionaires’ Row” towers over the well-kept lawn. NORTHA construction site. Some 42 million people visit the park annually, but most stay south.
TONY CENICOLA/THE NEW YORK TIMES JAMES ESTRIN/THE NEW YORK TIMESSOUTHThe Central Park Zoo, one of the top attractions in the park. NORTHThe 1960s-vintage Lasker Pool and skating rink will be replaced by 2024.
$110 Million Project
In Green Space
Often Overlooked
By JAMES BARRONJAMES ESTRIN/THE NEW YORK TIMES‘The whole premise of the park is about equity. It was to be a reprieve for every
person to connect with nature, especially those
who are least able to leave the city.’
Elizabeth W. Smith, president and chief executive of the Central Park ConservancyTHURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2019 A21
N