Manhattan · New York County
Central Park Great Lawn
NYC Parks
- Location
- Mid-Park, 79th to 86th Streets, Central Park
- Size
- 55 (within Central Park) acres
- Hours
- Central Park hours
- Type
- NYC Parks
The Great Lawn is a 55-acre oval of green in the center of Central Park, the most famous lawn in the world and the site of concerts that have drawn audiences of over half a million people.
The Great Lawn has hosted legendary free concerts including Simon and Garfunkel (1981, 500,000 people), the New York Philharmonic's annual summer concerts, Diana Ross (1983), and the Global Citizen Festival. The lawn becomes a sea of blankets and bodies during these events.
The lawn occupies the site of the former Croton Reservoir, a massive water supply facility that was drained and filled in the 1930s. Robert Moses oversaw the conversion from reservoir to recreation, creating the great open space that exists today.
Eight baseball diamonds ring the perimeter of the Great Lawn, providing free public playing fields that are used by thousands of recreational athletes each year. The diamonds are among the most popular in the city's park system.
The Great Lawn is the democratic heart of Central Park, a space large enough to hold the entire population of a small city, where the simple act of lying on the grass beneath the Manhattan skyline affirms the park's founding principle: that open space belongs to everyone.