Hoyt Lake in Delaware Park, with the Albright-Knox Art Gallery.

Many of the public parks and parkways system of Buffalo, New York were originally designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux between 1868 and 1896. They were inspired in large part by the parkland, boulevards, and squares of Paris, France. They include the parks, parkways and circles within the Cazenovia Park–South Park System and Delaware Park–Front Park System, both listed on the National Register of Historic Places and maintained by the Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy.

History

Frederick Law Olmsted described Buffalo as being "the best planned city [...] in the United States, if not the world".[1]: 49  With encouragement from city stakeholders, he and Calvert Vaux created an augmentation of the city's grid plan by drawing inspiration from Paris, introducing landscape architecture while embracing aspects of the countryside.[1]: 52–53  Their plan would introduce a system of interconnected parks, parkways and trails, unlike the singular Central Park in New York City.[1] The largest of them would be Delaware Park, situated across the large Forest Lawn Cemetery to amplify the amount of open land planned.: 53  With construction of the system finishing in 1876, it is regarded as being the oldest in the country,[2] although some of his plans were never fully realized. In the twentieth century, the diminishing parks would be afflicted by diseases, highway construction, and weather events such as Lake Storm Aphid in 2006.[3][1] In 1939, Buffalo's avenues were lined with hundreds of thousands of elm trees, maintained by the city's forestry division. The elms, which made up 60 per cent of the trees, were nearly all wiped out by Dutch elm disease in the 1950s.[4] From 1974 onwards, efforts were made to increase the tree cover,[5] and since 2001 the city has maintained an inventory of its urban forest.[6] The Buffalo Olmsted Park Conservancy, a non-profit organization, was created in 2004 to assist the city with protecting the 850 acres of parkland.[7] Olmsted's work in Buffalo would inspire similar efforts in cities such as San Francisco, Chicago, and Boston.[1]

Current parks

The city's Division of Parks and Recreation manages over 180 parks and facilities, seven recreational centers, 21 pools and splash pads, and three ice rinks.[8] The 350 acres (140 ha) Delaware Park features the Buffalo Zoo, Hoyt Lake, a golf course, and playing fields. Buffalo collaborated with sister city Kanazawa in Japan to create the park's Japanese Garden in 1970, where cherry blossoms bloom in the spring.[9] Shakespeare in Delaware Park has run every year since 1976 and attracts more 40,000 visitors from across the country.[10] Tifft Nature Preserve in South Buffalo sits on 264 acres (107 ha) of remediated industrial land, opening in 1976. The preserve offers trails for hiking and cross-country skiing, marshland with fishing permitted, and is an Important Bird Area.[11] Also in South Buffalo is the Olmsted-designed Cazenovia and South Parks, the latter home to the Buffalo and Erie County Botanical Gardens.[12] According to the Trust for Public Land, Buffalo's 2020 ParkScore ranking showed high marks in access to parks, with 90% of city residents living within a ten-minute walk of a park. However, the city ranked lower for acreage; 7.6% of city land is devoted to parks, compared to about 15% for Minneapolis.[13][14]

List of parks

Historical postcard illustrating a bridge in Delaware Park.

Park approaches

Tifft Nature Preserve

Parkways

Circles

Gardens

Nature Preserves

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Kowsky, Francis R. (March 1, 1987). "Municipal Parks and City Planning: Frederick Law Olmsted's Buffalo Park and Parkway System". Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians. 46 (1): 49–64. doi:10.2307/990145. JSTOR 990145.
  2. ↑ Schuyler, David (November 3, 2015). "Parks in Urban America". Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History: 1, 7. doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780199329175.013.58. ISBN 978-0-19-932917-5. Archived from the original on May 10, 2021. Retrieved May 9, 2021.
  3. ↑ Freedman, Andrew (January 2007). "Anatomy of a Forecast: 'Arborgeddon' Takes Buffalo by Surprise". Weatherwise. 60 (4): 16–21. doi:10.3200/WEWI.60.4.16-21. ISSN 0043-1672. S2CID 191572229. Archived from the original on May 11, 2021. Retrieved May 10, 2021.
  4. ↑ "Looking Backward: City of Trees". The Public. September 15, 2015. Archived from the original on April 14, 2021. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
  5. ↑ "City of Buffalo, NY: Trees, Shrubs and Plants". City of Buffalo, NY Code. March 5, 2019. Archived from the original on February 4, 2021. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
  6. ↑ "Buffalo, New York, Urban Tree Management Evolves from Surprise Storm". Esri. October 13, 2006. Archived from the original on April 14, 2021. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
  7. ↑ "About the Conservancy | Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy - His Legacy. Our Inheritance". Buffalo Olmsted Parks. Archived from the original on October 13, 2016. Retrieved May 16, 2021.
  8. ↑ "Division of Parks & Recreation | Buffalo, NY". City of Buffalo. Archived from the original on February 3, 2021. Retrieved May 16, 2021. and "Public Pool & Ice Skating Rink Information | Buffalo, NY". City of Buffalo. Archived from the original on May 10, 2021. Retrieved May 16, 2021.
  9. ↑ "Buffalo Olmsted Park System, Map & Guide" (PDF). Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy. Archived (PDF) from the original on May 16, 2021. Retrieved May 16, 2021.
  10. ↑ Bond, Francesca (July 9, 2019). "Going backstage - and on stage - at Shakespeare in Delaware Park". The Buffalo News. Retrieved May 22, 2021. and "History – Shakespeare in Delaware Park". Shakespeare in Delaware Park. Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  11. ↑ "About Us - Tifft Nature Preserve - Nature Next Door". Tifft Nature Preserve. Retrieved May 19, 2021. and "Tifft Nature Preserve - NYS Dept. of Environmental Conservation". New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. Retrieved May 19, 2021.
  12. ↑ "History". Buffalo and Erie County Botanical Gardens. Retrieved May 23, 2021.
  13. ↑ "The Trust for Public Land 2020 Park Score index - Buffalo, NY" (PDF). Trust for Public Land. 2020. Archived (PDF) from the original on June 19, 2020. Retrieved May 16, 2021.
  14. ↑ "The Trust for Public Land 2020 ParkScore index - Minneapolis, MN" (PDF). Trust for Public Land. 2020. Retrieved May 16, 2021.
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