Top Sledding Spots in Prospect Park
January 22, 2016
Both through nature and by design, Prospect Park’s landscape is dotted with rolling hills, which makes it prime territory for winter sledding. Here are just a few of the top sledding destinations in Brooklyn’s Backyard, recommended by Christian Zimmerman, Prospect Park Alliance’s Chief Landscape Architect.
The Long Meadow is the longest stretch of uninterrupted meadow in any urban park in the nation, and was designed by Park creators Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux with a number of rolling hills. Add in the long incline sloping down from Tennis House (enter at 9th Street then cross West Drive), and you’ve got the perfect recipe for long-run sledding.
Lookout Hill is the highest point in the Park. A grassy, treeless swatch on the hill’s southwest side is steep enough to satisfy any sledder’s need for speed. From the Vanderbilt Street entrance head northeast toward Wellhouse Drive.
On snowy days there tends to be fewer drummers in the aptly named Drummer’s Grove (near the Parkside and Ocean entrance), but the sounds of sledding on the small hill across the East Drive near the LeFrak Center at Lakeside fill the sonic void.
Enter the Park at Grand Army Plaza and head toward the Long Meadow via Endale Arch, then look to your left to scope out the short steep slope from the Park Drive to the meadow, a perfect place for first-time sledders.
