North Woods and North Meadow
The western portion of the North Woods also includes Great Hill, the third highest point in Central Park.
[3]: 196 The Pool and Loch in the North Woods were proposed by Central Park commissioner Robert J. Dillon, who included it as one of seventeen amendments to the Greensward Plan, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux's original design for Central Park.[6]: 134.
[5]: 78 Olmsted and Vaux also proposed an observation tower atop Great Hill, though this was never completed, either.
[3]: 251 However, because of growing recreational pressures, the Central Park commission opened North Meadow to sports by the late 19th century.
[3]: 404 In addition, there was a proposal to move the Central Park Zoo to the North Meadow in the 1890s, though this was controversial and largely opposed.
[3]: 414 [12] After the plan was cancelled, another proposal was made that would replace the "comfort station", refreshment stand, and storage shed in North Meadow with a single recreational center.
[12] Around this time, in 1911, North Meadow was temporarily closed for reseeding, to mitigate damage caused by heavy usage.
[17] Under NYC Parks commissioner Robert Moses, athletic fields were constructed in the North Meadow in the 1930s,[3]: 450 and bocce, tennis, and volleyball facilities for adults were installed in the Great Hill.
[18][8][3]: 451 The North Meadow was thus designated as an adults' play area, while the Great Lawn further south was reserved for children.
[19] When completed in 1966, the facility served as an ice rink in winter and Central Park's only swimming pool in summer.
[20][21] By the late 1960s, the Loch had deteriorated to such an extent that the cascades along its route had dried up, and the stream was jokingly referred to as "the Trickle".
[1]: 37–38 By 1987, the Central Park Conservancy had raised $2.5 million to build a tennis house, the current recreation center, in the North Meadow.
A white female jogger was badly beaten and raped at night in the North Woods, when 30-32 youths from East Harlem were known to have been roaming through the park, and accosting and sometimes assaulting eight other persons.
[25] A group of four black and one Hispanic teenagers, who became known as the "Central Park Five", were convicted of this and another assault, and sentenced to years in prison.
Their convictions were vacated after another man confessed to the crime in 2002, his DNA matched that found in semen at the scene, and the DA's office conducted an investigation of other elements of the evidence.
[5]: 520 In 1990, the Conservancy announced recreational programs and restoration projects to attract more people to the North Woods and, by extension, reduce crime.
[1]: 37–38 [28][41] The name sometimes also applies to other attractions in the park's northern end; if these adjacent features are included, the area of North Woods can be 200 acres (81 ha).
[43] The western portion of North Woods contains Great Hill, the third-highest point in Central Park, rising to 135 feet (41 m) above sea level.
[37] The Loch and Pool are adapted from a single watercourse called Montayne's Rivulet, originally fed from a natural spring but now replenished by the city's water system.
[5]: 48–49 [53] The Loch is the only stream in Central Park where an existing watercourse was left aboveground, rather than placed in a culvert underground.
[37] Its name is likely influenced from the trips that Central Park designer Frederick Law Olmsted made to the United Kingdom during the 1850s.
