Prospect Park Alliance / Welcome to Prospect Park

Prospect Park Alliance, also, Welcome to Prospect Park. . , Prospect Park Alliance - The Partnership Into the Next Century , Prospect Park needs you. You and your neighbors are making things happen in Prospect Park. Community involvement in the Park is coordinated through the Prospect Park Alliance, a non-profit organization established in 1987. The Alliance raises private dollars for cultural programming, enhanced park management and special projects., The award-winning restoration of the 1912 Coney Island-style Carousel was the Alliance's first capital project. Events at the Picnic House, the Boathouse and the Concert Grove have become local institutions. In 1993, Lefferts Homestead reopened as the country's first children's historic house museum. With the new Wildlife Center and the Carousel, it completes Prospect Park's "Children's Corner.", Who rents a boat, rides a carousel, buys a hot dog, ice skates in the most beautiful landscape found in any city, and in the same turn, plants a tree? You. When you visit Prospect Park and enjoy yourself with a pedal boat ride on the Lake or a twirl on the Carousel, you are helping to restore one of Brooklyn's greatest treasures. The Alliance operates the boat, skating, Carousel and cafe concessions in the Park to ensure better services to the Park's visitors and to help support programming and landscape restoration., Now serving 5.5 million and counting. With visitorship approaching record levels, the Prospect Park Alliance and City of New York Parks and Recreation turned their attention to the landscape. A series of Historic Landscape Reports conducted in the 1980s evaluated the Park's historic, cultural and natural resources, making recommendations for the Park's restoration. Using these and more recent studies, the Alliance and the Parks Department are developing a comprehensive plan for the Park's next 25 years. A critical feature of this Master Plan is a strategy for restoring our woodlands , the last in Brooklyn , as a model urban forest for our children.,

"The preservation of our forest trees upon the park is a matter of no little importance, inasmuch as they form a very characteristic feature in park scenery." , Brooklyn Parks Commissioners, 1885 Annual Report

, Today, the Park's woodlands are a scene of neglect and decay: eroded hillsides and silted water courses; dying mature trees; and an almost total lack of smaller trees and shrubs that are critical to the health of a forest. As plants die from trampling by thousands of visitors, the exposed topsoil is lost. The remaining compacted subsoils cannot support plant life because the roots cannot receive air, water or minerals that are crucial to survival.,

"In the west woods or picnic grounds, and elsewhere, the turf has been trodden out and the earth so compacted and hardened by continuous use, as doubtless to deprive many of these trees of the nourishment through the medium of natural sources, air and moisture, which is unquestionably essential to their vitality. , Brooklyn Parks Commissioners, 1885 Annual Report, Saving our woodlands will take the hard work of staff, volunteers, youth crew and school classes. You can help too., Staten Island's young forest is a model for Prospect Park's woodlands.

, How do you Save Brooklyn's Last Forest? Stabilizing the forest will require the Alliance to raise $700,000 more each year for staffing and supplies. It also means that the city must continue its commitment to the Park's restoration, averaging $3 million each year in capital improvements to the paths, drainage and other infrastructure, a tradition established by Borough President Howard Golden., The Landscape Management Plan for the Natural Areas of Prospect Park (1994) identifies a path to recovery for the Park's woodlands. Today, throughout the nearly 250 acres of Park woodlands, visitors may witness the slow, methodical stabilization of slopes with log "cribs" between which are planted native wildflowers and young trees to "knit" the fragile soil. This and other woodland restoration is done by the Park's Natural Resources Crew. They are supplemented by volunteers and youth programs, all coordinated by the Prospect Park Alliance. Stabilizing the woodlands is anticipated to take 25 years., Enhanced public information, including new signs, a woodlands video and school campaigns to reduce litter and raise awareness are being implemented to help visitors use the Park and woodlands in a healthier way., Welcome to Prospect Park , Facts About Prospect Park ,

. Designated a N.Y.C. Scenic Landmark in 1975 , . Placed on the National Register of Historic Places, 1980 , . Site of the Battle of Long Island, the American Revolution, August 27, 1776 , . Designed 1866 by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux , . Original construction 1866-1874 with later changes , . Park Size: 526 acres , . Prospect Lake: (Man-made, Average depth-7 feet) 60 acres , . Water Course: (Swan Boat Lake to Terrace Bridge) 1 mile long , . The Long Meadow: 1 mile long , . Woodlands: 250 acres , . Trees outside Woodlands: Approximately 10,000