The Pond and Hallett Nature Sanctuary are two connected features at the southeastern corner of

Central Park Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban park in the United States, with an estimated ...

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. It is located near Grand Army Plaza, across

Central Park South 59th Street is a crosstown street in the New York City borough of Manhattan, running from York Avenue and Sutton Place on the East Side of Manhattan to the West Side Highway on the West Side. The three-block portion between Columbus Circle an ...

from the

Plaza Hotel The Plaza Hotel (also known as The Plaza) is a luxury hotel and condominium apartment building in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is located on the western side of Grand Army Plaza, after which it is named, just west of Fifth Avenue, ...

, and slightly west of

Fifth Avenue Fifth Avenue is a major and prominent thoroughfare in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It stretches north from Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village to West 143rd Street in Harlem. It is one of the most expensive shopping ...

. The Pond is one of seven bodies of water in Central Park.

Hallett Sanctuary

The Hallett Nature Sanctuary is the smallest of Central Park's wooded areas at . Originally known as the Promontory, it is the only permanently fenced-off section of Central Park aside from

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir The Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir, also known as Central Park Reservoir, is a decommissioned reservoir in Central Park in the borough of Manhattan, New York City, stretching from 86th to 96th Streets. It covers and holds over 10⁹ US ...

, occupies of the wooded promontory to the west of the Pond, jutting into the water body. The area was closed in 1934 when

NYC Parks The New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, also called the Parks Department or NYC Parks, is the department of the government of New York City responsible for maintaining the city's parks system, preserving and maintaining the ecolo ...

commissioner

Robert Moses Robert Moses (December 18, 1888 – July 29, 1981) was an American urban planner and public official who worked in the New York metropolitan area during the early to mid 20th century. Despite never being elected to any office, Moses is regarded ...

set the site apart as a

bird sanctuary An animal sanctuary is a facility where animals are brought to live and to be protected for the rest of their lives. Pattrice Jones, co-founder of VINE Sanctuary defines an animal sanctuary as "a safe-enough place or relationship within the cont ...

. In the 1980s, after decades of neglect, invasive alien plants like

ailanthus ''Ailanthus'' (; derived from ''ailanto,'' an Ambonese word probably meaning "tree of the gods" or "tree of heaven") is a genus of trees belonging to the family Simaroubaceae, in the order Sapindales (formerly Rutales or Geraniales). The genus ...

and Far Eastern

wisteria ''Wisteria'' is a genus of flowering plants in the legume family, Fabaceae (Leguminosae), that includes ten species of woody twining vines that are native to China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Southern Canada, the Eastern United States, and north ...

s were extirpated, and the equally invasive though native black cherry was thinned, the woodland was enriched with native shrubs. The reserve was renamed in 1986, in honor of

George Hervey Hallett Jr https://www.iruang.coGeorge Hervey Hallett Jr. (1895–1985) was a civic activist and avid birder. As head of Citizens Union, a municipal watchdog group, he led the revision of the New York City Charter that was adopted by voters in 1975. Hallett ...

. (1895–1985), an ardent birdwatcher and naturalist and executive secretary of the Citizens Union. The Hallett Sanctuary was reopened to the public in 2016, when the Central Park Conservancy started allowing visitors to enter the sanctuary during middays. Pond cascade CP jeh

The Central Park Conservancy routinely offers half-hour tours; they avoid nesting season and the height of migratory season, because Central Park is a stopover on the Atlantic Flyway. The perimeter affords one of the prime bird watching areas of the Park. Formerly, deadfalls remained where they lay, to provide for insects that feed birds. However, the experiment ended after an

Asian longhorn beetle The Asian long-horned beetle (''Anoplophora glabripennis''), also known as the starry sky, sky beetle, or ALB, is native to eastern China, and Korea. This species has now been accidentally introduced into the United States, where it was first dis ...

was discovered in 2002. Another unexpected visitor was

Hal the Central Park Coyote Urban coyotes are coyotes that reside in North American metropolitan areas (major cities and their suburbs). Coyotes thrive in suburban settings and urban regions, because of the availability of food and the lack of predators. One report describe ...

, who received his nickname from the Hallett Sanctuary and passed through briefly in March 2006.

The Pond

As originally laid out by

Frederick Law Olmsted Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822August 28, 1903) was an American landscape architect, journalist, social critic, and public administrator. He is considered to be the father of landscape architecture in the USA. Olmsted was famous for co- ...

and Calvert Vaux, the Pond was considerably larger. A large piece of its upper reaches, which once spanned a narrow neck of water, was paved over to form

Wollman Rink Wollman Rink is a public ice rink in the southern part of Central Park, Manhattan, New York City. It is named after the Wollman family who donated the funds for its original construction. The rink is open for ice skating from late October ...

, which opened in 1950. Nearby, on stone plinths, bronze busts commemorate the poet

Thomas Moore Thomas Moore (28 May 1779 – 25 February 1852) was an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist celebrated for his ''Irish Melodies''. Their setting of English-language verse to old Irish tunes marked the transition in popular Irish culture from Irish ...

and the composer

Victor Herbert Victor August Herbert (February 1, 1859 – May 26, 1924) was an American composer, cellist and conductor of English and Irish ancestry and German training. Although Herbert enjoyed important careers as a cello soloist and conductor, he is bes ...

(by

Edmond Thomas Quinn Edmond Thomas Quinn (1868 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – September 1929 in New York City) was an American sculptor and painter. He is best known for his bronze statue of ''Edwin Booth as Hamlet'', which stands at the center of Gramercy Park ...

). The

Central Park Conservancy The Central Park Conservancy is a private, nonprofit park conservancy that manages Central Park under a contract with the City of New York and NYC Parks. The conservancy employs most maintenance and operations staff in the park. It effectively ...

started a reconstruction of the Pond in 2000, and completed it the next year. The reconstruction included new shoreline and perimeter plantings, an island habitat for birds and turtles, and beyond Gapstow Bridge, a series of small pools and cascades. A male mandarin duck resident of the Pond, nicknamed

Mandarin Patinkin The Central Park mandarin duck, also known as Mandarin Patinkin or the Hot Duck, is a male mandarin duck seen at the Pond in New York City's Central Park starting in late 2018. Its colorful appearance, which contrasted with native waterfowl, c ...

, received international media attention in late 2018 and early 2019; the duck's colorful appearance and the species' appearance outside its native range in

East Asia East Asia is the eastern region of Asia, which is defined in both geographical and ethno-cultural terms. The modern states of East Asia include China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan. China, North Korea, South Korea ...

contributed to its popularity. The Pond is spanned by Gapstow Bridge, a

schist Schist ( ) is a medium-grained metamorphic rock showing pronounced schistosity. This means that the rock is composed of mineral grains easily seen with a low-power hand lens, oriented in such a way that the rock is easily split into thin flakes ...

structure built in 1896 by Howard & Caudwell. It replaced an 1871 bridge by

Jacob Wrey Mould Jacob Wrey Mould (7 August 1825 – 14 June 1886) was a British architect, illustrator, linguist and musician, noted for his contributions to the design and construction of New York City's Central Park. He was "instrumental" in bringing the Brit ...

. The first bridge was a wooden bridge supported by segmental arches on either side of the deck, the tops of which rose above the deck, similar to the design of a through arch bridge.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Pond and Hallett Nature Sanctuary Central Park Lakes of Manhattan Lakes of New York (state)