The idea behind Columbus Circle was a good one. The corner of a large park (Central Park, in this case) is a good place to have a monumental space. The only problem was reality: the southwest corner of Central Park is the intersection of Central Park West (AKA Eight Avenue), Central Park South (AKA 59th Street), and Broadway, with secondary intersections of 58th and 60th Streets. CPW and CPS are major streets, and the portions of Broadway north and south of the circle are diagonal and are misaligned with one another. In other words, even if the traffic was light, there are a lot of different directions people might want to go.
The Columbus monument at the center of the circle was erected in 1892, just in time to have to be shored and underpinned as the IRT subway was constructed under it ten years later, following the irregular line of Broadway. For a long time, the monument stood on a small island surrounded by a large circle of undifferentiated traffic lanes, like a pylon in a racetrack. Here it is in 1913:
And 1921 or so:
By the 1940s, attempts were made to rationalize the traffic patterns, although the method that was chosen – basically, channelling the traffic into north-south lanes with few turn options – made certain obvious paths, like heading due north from Eighth Avenue to Central Park West, impossible. Here’s 1952:
That layout stayed until the late 1990s, with a few changes to try to accommodate the previously-blocked paths. Here’s 1976 (dated by the construction of the Citicorp Center in the background):
Finally, in the late 1990s, the obvious answer to the problem was implemented: make it a real traffic circle, with a center island big enough to force people to go around the circle rather than try to cut across the middle. In 2005, the big center island was turned into a mini-park and that’s how it remains.
You must be logged in to post a comment.