The New York Observer » Central Park

One57 Already Getting Foreign Capital

Well, that didn't take long. One57, that prime slab of midtown real estate, is already attracting top foreign-dollar, The Post reports. Apparently both Chinese and Russian tycoons are in contract to buy eight figure units in thee building, which comes as little surprise. Extell, the developers behind One57, have been unabashedly courting foreign buyers for months. Read More

Do the Neighs Have It? Activists Try to Dissuade Tourists from Carriage Rides

The two little blonde girls, each no more than nine, stood next to their parents on the cobblestone sidewalk at 59th Street and Fifth Avenue, slouching in the way only bored children can. Moments before, an older woman had come up to the family wielding a flyer emblazoned with the words “DON’T RIDE A HORSE CARRIAGE,” and proceeded to feverishly explain what she viewed as the evils of the industry. During the speech, the girls’ father stared blankly into the intersection. He finally looked down at his daughter and asked, “What do you think about that? You asked earlier…about the horses? How they were treated?” Read More

Note to OWS: Please Don’t Occupy Central Park With Your Igloos

We are very serious here: The Occupy Wall Street movement's biggest resource drain right now is trying to keep up the habitation of Zuccotti Park. Whatever message OWS may or may not have had has, in the past week or so, become a secondary concern to just keeping people alive, fed, warm, and un-raped. The media has also switched its attention to the more salacious stories about criminals and crazies slipping in amongst the protesters instead to what people were protesting to begin with.

So you know what wouldn't help with this issue, now that the winter months are at our heels? Moving people to Central Park and building them igloos to live in, as has been suggested with this weekend's upcoming Park march as well as the remarks of one entirely delusional person who spoke to Gothamist today.

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Tying the Knot in a Pop-Up

In the days after the same-sex marriage law was passed, a group of friends hatched a plan. “We got really excited and said, ‘Let’s do free weddings, it’s the least we can do,’” Bex Schwartz, one of the creators of Pop-Up Chapel, told The Observer. She was still bubbling with excitement when we Read More

Pedestrians Beware

City Hall’s obsession with bicycles is no secret. Bike lanes have been popping up all over town, to the chagrin of those who see no reason to make the flow of vehicular traffic—and, thus, commerce—any slower than it is already. However, perhaps time and climate change will prove that Mayor Bloomberg’s bikers were visionaries and Read More

Could Tavern On The Green Be Saved?

Word got out yesterday that Tavern on the Green may be on the fast track for a new era of pond-side dinner opulence. The beloved Central Park restaurant has been closed for over a year since union and bankruptcy issues shut the doors in early 2010, but it seems to have found a savior in Read More

A Generation of Groundbreaking Buildings on the Park [Pics]

The developers Steve Roth and Veronica Hackett have, after years of court cases and millions of dollars, finally secured their jewel on Central Park, as The Observer's Laura Kusisto reports in this week's print edition. The dumpy rental building at 220 Central Park South will soon be replaced with yet another soaring luxury building. Tentative Read More

NYPD Now Stalking Cyclists

Last week we warned cyclists to look out for cops cracking down on even minor bike infractions to gin up enforcement stats. It appears to be even worse than The Observer initially fathomed, as Streetsblog has a nightmarish tale from the former bike haven, now bike hell, that is Central Park.

It all begins Read More

Adventures in Affordable Housing: Central Park Tree Houses

As rents climb back toward record highs and the city's unemployment rate stays above 9 percent, affordable housing remains just as critical an issue now as it was during the real estate boom. Fortunately, two hoodlums from Florida may have a solution to the city's housing problems.

The Times ran a quixotic story on the front Read More

Still-Together Peter Brant and Stephanie Seymour Shopping for Apartments

Interview magazine publisher — and Polo enthusiast — Peter Brant and former supermodel Stephanie Seymour reunited yesterday after a year and a half of vicious divorce proceedings. Now they're making the recommitment even more official. The New York Post reports that the couple is shopping around for townhouses on both sides of Central Park. It seems there Read More

In Wake of Prospect Park Goose Massacre, Central Park Quietly Continues More Humane Expulsion Method

In the wake of the recent gassing of Prospect Park's popular goose population—one that appalled local goose-lovers and even prompted a protest outside the mayor's Upper East Side mansion—the Central Park Conservancy is quietly continuing its considerably more humane geese expulsion method.

Starting in late August, when molting season ends, a Conservancy contractor called Read More

iPhone App Will Bring Deliveries to Sheep Meadow This Summer

If you're anything like us, Sheep Meadow dining brings to mind Triscuits and questionable street produce dipped into sun-baked tubs of Alouette or browning containers of guac'.

No more.

From July 10 through Labor Day weekend, CityMint, a new iPhone app, will deliver orders from participating local restaurants (including Big Nick's, China Fun, and Pita Read More

My 1984 Black Lanvin Hat Is Off to the Central Park Conservancy Luncheon

So every year I promise myself I’m never going back to this totally intimidating but really-for-a-good-cause luncheon of women with endless resources to spend on hats. And each year, like a drug addict drawn to a fix, I’m back gawking at the crowd of ladies who don’t know from the word recession, or the fact Read More

Cuozzo Slams City on Tavern Debacle

The Post's Steve Cuozzo, in tip-top Cuozzo form Wednesday morning, excoriates the Bloomberg administration for allowing Tavern on the Green to languish in a state of empty decay.

In a column entitled, "Cavern on the green: Shame of famous eatery's dark decay," Mr. Cuozzo writes:

Nearly four months since Tavern on the Green went dark, there's Read More

Central Park Tennis Courts To Bubble Over?

On Thursday evening, Community Board 7's Parks and Preservation committee will hold a meeting to discuss having three translucent "bubbles" cover public tennis courts by the Central Park Tennis Center, located at 94th and 95th streets. Originating from the Parks Department, 26 Har-Tru courts would be weatherproofed from Nov. 15 to March 24 every year for Read More