Crotona Park

About

Crotona Park is a public park in the South Bronx in New York City, covering 127.5 acres (51.6 ha). The park is bounded by streets of the same name on its northern, eastern, southern, and western borders, and is adjacent to the Crotona Park East and Morrisania neighborhoods of the Bronx. It is divided into four portions by Claremont Parkway and Crotona Avenue, which run through it.

Crotona Park formerly belonged to the Bathgate family, a prominent landowning family in the South Bronx. It was created through the New Parks Act in 1888 as part of a boroughwide network of parks connected by parkways. The Crotona Play Center was added in 1936. Crotona Park was formerly 155 acres (63 ha), but the northern portion was cut off by the Cross Bronx Expressway in 1945, becoming what is now known as Walter Gladwin Park. After a period of deterioration in the late 20th century, several improvement projects were commenced starting in the 1990s.