When taking a walk from 110th Street south into Central Park, visitors may at first wonder where the new Davis Center is. It’s certainly not as easy to spot as the old Lasker Rink and Pool, because it’s tucked into the landscape of the park near the Harlem Meer.

“It’s a significant, contemporary recreational amenity that is now in the park. The old facility had tremendous value from a programmatic perspective, but it was really an object in the park, not part of the park,” Christopher Nolan, project executive and former chief landscape architect for the Central Park Conservancy, said.

What You Need To Know

  • The Davis Center at the Harlem Meer is a new multi-use facility at the north end of Central Park

  • It will have swimming in the summer, ice skating in the winter and will be used as a public green during the remaining months

  • It opens to the public on Saturday, April 26

Nolan is talking about just one aspect of the conservancy’s comprehensive restoration of the north end of the park, which includes the facility replacing the old pool and rink. 

Nolan and Conservancy President and CEO Betsy Smith showed NY1 around the $160 million project. The centerpiece is the Davis Center, a swimming pool in the summer, ice rink in winter and a public green — kind of a sheep meadow for the northern edge of the park during the remaining months. 

“Our ambition is to create more park and make it more seamless so people can be in and around this facility but not necessarily using it,” Smith said of the connectivity of the new project.

If Lasker was a roadblock of sorts for visitors, Davis allows for more free passing from one part of the park to another, in particular for residents of Harlem and East Harlem.

A green roof on the center also acts as a walkway, connecting to pathways around the Harlem Meer and a boardwalk that takes visitors over the water. The watercourse that flows through the north woods through the Huddlestone Arch has been reconnected into the meer.

The conservancy calls this their most significant and complex project since its founding in 1980. The site is more than eight acres.

“This whole idea of getting the people of New York closer to the water, appreciating the beauty of the park and approaching a new facility was very much part of the planning,” Smith said.

Design leadership on the project came from Nolan, design architect Susan T. Rodriguez and executive architect John Doherty from Mitchell Giurgola Architects.

It’s a project the conservancy would like to think legendary park designers Olmsted and Vaux would be smiling about if they got the chance to see it.

It opens to the public on Saturday, April 26.