A Winter Drive

By Sara Cedar Miller

A film by Thomas Edison, circa 1898, shows sleigh-riding along Central Park's Winter Drive. Credit: Library of Congress.

Even in the cold of winter, there's plenty of green in Central Park's landscapes.

Evergreens have an interesting history in Central Park and played an important role in its original plan. Park designers Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux created the carriage drive on the west side as the "Winter Drive," lining it with a parade of evergreens from 72nd Street up to 102nd Street. The designers wanted the Park's winter visitors to enjoy the scene of snow-covered greenery as they rode in their horse-drawn sleighs. In between the pines, they could catch a glimpse of the ice-skaters gliding on the frozen waters of the Lake. Along the drive at 81st Street, Calvert and Vaux also created the aptly named Winterdale Arch, surrounded by mature evergreens.

Winterdale Arch, at 81st Street.

But by the mid-1900's, most of the evergreens from the original Winter Drive had died off and were not replanted. In the 1970's, a decade before the Conservancy's founding, New Yorker and philanthropist Arthur Ross set out to return pines to Central Park, drawing on a passion for evergreens that he developed as a businessman in the pulp and paper industry. Ross began planting pines north of the Great Lawn near 86th Street, using them to hide the buildings on the transverse road. Ross continued to plant pines when he became a founding trustee of the Central Park Conservancy in 1980. Today known as the Arthur Ross Pinetum, the pines have spread east and west to both drives and now feature 17 different species of pine trees.

The Pinetum's creation can be considered the beginning of the Winter Drive revival. When landscape architect Bruce Kelly began restoring Strawberry Fields in 1983, he revived the southern terminus of the Winter Drive, introducing a grove of five 50-foot white pines (Pinus strobus) that command the tip of the lower meadow. The biggest trees ever planted in Central Park, the pines stand as one of the most beautiful groves in the Park when covered in snow. To keep the Winter Drive green in all four seasons, Kelly also placed 25-foot columnar red cedars (Juniperus virginiana) and several English holly (Ilex aquifolium).

While sleighs are absent from the Park today, a walk, run or bike ride along the revived Winter Drive also revives the feeling of the Park's original winter experience. Explore the Pinetum on your next visit to Central Park, or learn more about Kellys work in the book Strawberry Fields:Central Park’s Memorial to John Lennon.