Thread by @gauravsabnis

Fun little known fact inspired by this absolutely gorgeous shot. If you're ever lost in Central Park and want to return to the concrete jungle, every lamp post is like a GPS location.
1st 2 digits - nearest street
Last 2 digits - lower at the thin lines, even east, odd west.

https://twitter.com/BabaGlocal/status/1390515430528360451

So 6803 on the lamp means you're really close to 68th street and Central Park West,
6802 means you're really close to 68th St and 5th avenue
6842 means you're along 68th street but at the centre of the park, slightly to the east.
Etc.

Little known nerdy fact to navigate.

Most visitors to Central Park, even most NYC residents, assume it is this huge gorgeous wildernesses that leaves the original Manhattan untouched and gives us a slice of its non concrete existence.
That's only partially true. That "wilderness" originally looked very different.

It's true that it exists because 150 years ago or so, the city decided to designate a park and allow no construction. But it was a mostly rocky barren uneven patch with only a few trees here and there. Olmstead and others designed it, inch by inch, to look like a wilderness.

Every noticed how few flower beds you see in Central Park, as opposed to other big parks around the world? That's Olmstead too. He found Paris style flower beds too artificial. Preferred the wild natural look of Hyde Park and other such English parks. Designed CP like that.

This diversity of trees and landscapes and rock formations in Central Park, that makes it convincingly seem like what Manhattan might have looked like before... It has been very painstakingly curated and maintained to look like that for over a century. The "natural" look.

Funny thing is, Olmstead wasn't a trained architect or designer or anything. He was just another young struggling writer and journalist in his 30s in NYC trying to get by. Heard about this design contest for a proposed park. Sent in his entry. Won.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick…

Ugh, Olmsted. Just realized autocorrect kept making it Olmstead.

Anyway, funny weird P.S.
When the city decided to commemorate Olmsted's 150th birthday, clearly, no one had read much about Olmsted. Cos he's memorialized with a (very beautiful) flower bed, one thing he hated the most in parks. 😂😂😂

centralparknyc.org/locations/olms…

I first read about it in @exlarson's modern classic Devil in the White City. This is a good summary.

This one time @abhijitkadle showed me his backyard and talked about his philosophy and process over two decades in planning and maintaining it, I was like, you're so clearly a New York boy at heart still, cos you sound like Olmsted. 😍😍😍

Glad you brought it up. Olmsted influenced Burnham a lot, when they worked together on the Chicago 1893 world's fair (for desis, vivekananda). Burnham eventually cited Olmsted's ideas to argue that everything between the Capitol & Lincoln Memorial be open

https://twitter.com/juneymb/status/1390626633887862789?s=19

The US equivalent of the "Central Vista" project happened about a century ago. But it didn't destroy anything or restrict anything. In fact it expanded public access and made the National Mall a 3 km uninterrupted open stretch of greenery where no security guards hassle you.

This long green 3 km uninterrupted stretch of all kinds of awesome things you see between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial at the National Mall is also kinda because of Olmsted. There used to be railroad tracks and other random stuff in between. Removed for better access.