WI: Manhattan was developed without Central Park?

Not sure if this should go before or after 1900. The Park was developed in the 1850's as I recall.

I've lived in major metropolitan areas with few accessible parks and no "green" ones for a few years. Its always fascinated me why an area like Manhattan needs such occupier of space that could be used for other building purposes.

So my question is, what if Manhattan was developed without the park? Would New York still be as attractive a location to American and foreign business interests? Or would it be an even more powerful financial center with all the free space? Would the culture of NYC be any different?
 
Thanks.
Edit: Now that I've read them, the links were very interesting. It seems that Seneca Village was only a small part of the overall area, and more than a thousand people were also displaced, so I'm not sure it was specifically targeted at the black landowners, but no doubt there would have been less concern about using eminent domain to acquire the properties of black people.
 
Last edited:

Kaze

Banned
I thought Central Park was developed because it was the City's trash dump and some idiot came back from Europe and said, "Let us move the dump outside the city and make it like Hyde Park in London but better."
 
I thought Central Park was developed because it was the City's trash dump and some idiot came back from Europe and said, "Let us move the dump outside the city and make it like Hyde Park in London but better."

I don't think moving a trash dump outside the city would be "idiotic".
 
I don't think moving a trash dump outside the city would be "idiotic".
Americans have a proud tradition on living on colossal piles of garbage, dating back to the native Mound Builders and culminating in Virginia's Mt. Trashmore. To shun our garbage-mounds would be to shun liberty herself.
 
Top