History
The original design for Prospect Park did not include the seven playgrounds that dot its perimeter. At the time that Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux planned for the construction of the Park, the idea of a play space designated for children was relatively new, and the landscape architects’ philosophy of a strictly naturalistic environment did not accommodate such structured installations.

In the 1880s, New York City reformers lobbied for the creation of special small parks for children. As the City’s population more than doubled between 1865 and 1895, open spaces in which children could play were widely disappearing. By the turn of the century, the idea that recreational spaces were necessary for the health and well-being of urban children was gaining popularity, and the earliest playgrounds, called "sand gardens," were being built on the grounds of settlement houses on the overcrowded Lower East Side of Manhattan.



                                                                                                                    Lincoln Road Playground, 1928


In the 1930s, federal aid through the Works Progress Administration enabled the City to greatly expand and improve its play spaces. It was during this era that Prospect Park’s playgrounds, along with more than 600 others throughout New York City, were built. Parks Commissioner Robert Moses and his 80,000 employees increased the number of playgrounds in New York City from 119 in 1934 to 777 by 1960 - the end of his career with Parks. These large, asphalted playgrounds were designed to accommodate children of all ages, and they usually contained features such as sandboxes, see-saws, metallic jungle gyms, swing sets, and slides.

Restoration
In the late 1980s, the Alliance undertook responsibility for the design and oversight of playground renovations in the Park. The first Alliance-designed and supervised playground renovation was a $1 million project undertaken in 1989 at the Vanderbilt Street Playground. This was followed by the renovation of the Third Street Playground during winter 1993, and the $2 million renovation of the Lincoln Road Playground in 1994. Third Street received additional restoration in 2007.

Formerly known as the Eleventh Street Playground, the Harmony Playground reopened in 2002 after a 15-month, $1.7 million renovation. The design, featuring water motifs for kids of all ages, received the New York City Art Commission’s Award for Excellence in Design. 

Once known as the Ocean Avenue Playground, Imagination Playground was transformed in fall 1995 into one of the Park’s most fanciful and innovative play areas. The $1.5 million renovation included the addition of a water-spouting dragon and a storytelling area centered around statues of Brooklyn-born author Ezra Jack Keats’ characters Peter, his dog Willie, and Peter’s chair. The Playground and its dragon were designed by Alliance landscape architect Christian Zimmerman, and the Keats characters were sculpted by Brooklyn artist Otto Neals. Both men received City of New York Art Commission Excellence in Design Awards for their outstanding work on this project.

The creation of the Garfield Tot Lot is an excellent example of an Alliance partnership with active neighborhood residents. Parents in the Park Slope community worked with the Alliance to raise private funds for the construction of a toddler’s playground. In addition to underwriting the 1992 Tot Lot project, the Garfield Tot Lot Committee raised enough money to fund landscaping for the surrounding area and to provide a part-time maintenance worker for two years.