Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I wonder if there was ever a proposal to put some kind of look-out tower in the middle of Central Park, as a focal point of the Park, to help draw people into the Park, provide a great view of the park and surroundings over the treetops? I'm not a big fan of big parks like Central, preferring the smaller Plazas de Armas they have all over Latin America and if the Spanish had reached NY first, that's what you'd be seeing all over the city, lots of smaller plaza/like parks. In one plaza/like park I recently visited in San Vicente, El Salvador they built a funky Eiffel Tower like structure which soars into the sky where you can climb up to the top for some fabulous views. An in many Latin American cities they build a big state of Christ on a nearby hilltop, connected by cable cars. In one city in Chile they built a huge statue of Christ with an elevator to take you to the top, and in Cochabamba, Bolivia, they have one of the biggest of all on a hilltop, connected by cable cars, where you can climb up to the top. Now, I'm not suggesting a huge statue of Christ like that for the middle of Central Park or even an Eiffel Tower like structure, but something round and very tall, so visitors could walk up to the top and peer over the tree tops for some astounding views. Has anything like this ever been proposed for this Park?
I wonder if there was ever a proposal to put some kind of look-out tower in the middle of Central Park, as a focal point of the Park, to help draw people into the Park, provide a great view of the park and surroundings over the treetops? I'm not a big fan of big parks like Central, preferring the smaller Plazas de Armas they have all over Latin America and if the Spanish had reached NY first, that's what you'd be seeing all over the city, lots of smaller plaza/like parks. In one plaza/like park I recently visited in San Vicente, El Salvador they built a funky Eiffel Tower like structure which soars into the sky where you can climb up to the top for some fabulous views. An in many Latin American cities they build a big state of Christ on a nearby hilltop, connected by cable cars. In one city in Chile they built a huge statue of Christ with an elevator to take you to the top, and in Cochabamba, Bolivia, they have one of the biggest of all on a hilltop, connected by cable cars, where you can climb up to the top. Now, I'm not suggesting a huge statue of Christ like that for the middle of Central Park or even an Eiffel Tower like structure, but something round and very tall, so visitors could walk up to the top and peer over the tree tops for some astounding views. Has anything like this ever been proposed for this Park?
No tower, but in the early days of Central Park, tethered balloons were utilized to give people the view. The balloon was brought back last summer for about a month as part of the park design's 150th anniversary celebration and brought people about 300 feet into the air.
Lincolnparker: Are you just joking or are you serious? You can climb to the top via stairwells? When I was trekking around England I ran into one of these brick, cylindrical follies, where you could take an exhausting walk up to the top of it for some memorable views. Something like that, unobstrusive, I could picture there in Central Park. Or how about a ferris wheel. It's seems like there's a race on now to top The Eye in London, all over the world. Looks like Beijing's ferris wheel is going to reach 650 feet high. Now New York has its chance to top that, right there in the middle of Central Park?
Last edited by tijlover; 01-07-2009 at 12:33 AM..
Reason: Add a few more lines
You can go up the Belvedere, where there's a weather station, and look out. You can't miss it: like a little castle in the area of the West 70s/low 80s in the park.
I wonder if there was ever a proposal to put some kind of look-out tower in the middle of Central Park, as a focal point of the Park, to help draw people into the Park, provide a great view of the park and surroundings over the treetops? I'm not a big fan of big parks like Central, preferring the smaller Plazas de Armas they have all over Latin America and if the Spanish had reached NY first, that's what you'd be seeing all over the city, lots of smaller plaza/like parks. In one plaza/like park I recently visited in San Vicente, El Salvador they built a funky Eiffel Tower like structure which soars into the sky where you can climb up to the top for some fabulous views. An in many Latin American cities they build a big state of Christ on a nearby hilltop, connected by cable cars. In one city in Chile they built a huge statue of Christ with an elevator to take you to the top, and in Cochabamba, Bolivia, they have one of the biggest of all on a hilltop, connected by cable cars, where you can climb up to the top. Now, I'm not suggesting a huge statue of Christ like that for the middle of Central Park or even an Eiffel Tower like structure, but something round and very tall, so visitors could walk up to the top and peer over the tree tops for some astounding views. Has anything like this ever been proposed for this Park?
lol......everything you are describing totally goes against the original central park design.....a big statue of Christ with cable cars connecting it riding high above the tree tops etc ....would RUIN central park , glad you dont work for the parks department
and central park is big b/c is needs to be, it would be totally out of scale with the surrounding city if it were a "small park or plaza type park"
here is the statue the OP is talking about, what do you think people in NYC would do if this were built right in the middle of the park higher than the tree tops http://www.ourworldeconomics.com/scourworld/statue.jpg
You can go up the Belvedere, where there's a weather station, and look out. You can't miss it: like a little castle in the area of the West 70s/low 80s in the park.
As quoted above, there are places in central park in which you can look out from & see the sights: which are truly spectacular. The Belvedere is my favorite.
There are also high points in the Southern part of the park, as well as by Sheep's meadow in which you can get a beautiful view of a skyline of buildings contrasted by nature.
Rudbeckia: Thanks for the pix. I took the cable car up to this statue in Cochabama, Bolivia a few years back. It's awesome! No, I never envisioned a statue of this caliber in the Park, I was just hinting at what other cities have built as a different type of look-out tower for their city, as a focal pt. for that big park, something far less obstrusive.
Zyrcagirl: Thanks ever so much for the photos of Belvedere. I was in NYC in early Dec., a lot of rain during my stay, so I never got into the park to discover all its treasures. So come Sept. I will certainly make a beeline to this place and discover the park in its entirety. So sorry I missed it.
Now, I'm not suggesting a huge statue of Christ like that for the middle of Central Park or even an Eiffel Tower like structure, but something round and very tall, so visitors could walk up to the top and peer over the tree tops for some astounding views. Has anything like this ever been proposed for this Park?
That's what we have the Empire State Building for .....
I think the best part about Central Park is that you can forget you're in the city a little. There are parts where you can't see any of the buildings around it and you feel like you're in the country and you can actually connect to nature in a nice way (even though the brooks and streams are piped in, the sounds are soothing). The last thing I'd want there is a huge tower to look at buildings and the congestion surrounding the park - but Belvedere Castle is really nice, and about as high as I'd want to have a lookout in CP. After looking out at the pond you can stroll through the Shakespeare Garden which is a quiet zone. I love that I've seen tons of goldfinches in CP, and I've sat down in a quiet spot to listen to the cardinals singing. Anyone who works within a 10- to 15-minute walk often eats their lunch there in nice weather. For me, CP is a refuge for New Yorkers, not a tourist attraction.
Before they made it an official park they were going to designate Jones Wood (a popular picnic area) as the city park, and that just would've been too small, only from about 59th to about 86th (I think), east of 2nd Avenue.
Central Park has baseball fields, tennis, skating, volleyball, playgrounds, stages for concerts and plays, a zoo, skaters, bikers, joggers, the reservoir, pine groves, lakes, ponds, meadows, weed walks, bird watching, hawks, falcons, the Museum, restaurants, bicycles to rent, boats to paddle, "That Guitar Man" playing every summer (David Ippolito who's even been on some official park maps) -- Thank goodness CP is as large as it is! Sometimes I think if NYers didn't have such large parks (such as CP and Prospect in Brooklyn), we'd all go mad and kill each other.
Last edited by citychik; 01-08-2009 at 02:24 AM..
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
"look-outs" in Central Park
