Central Park, based on the English naturalistic romantic landscape tradition, became the first designed American public park (today Central Park is a designated New York City Scenic Landmark and National Historic Landmark).Р”Р„side from the scenic and recreational values it would provide, the presence of Central Park was also seen as a spur to development. A competition held in 1857 for the parkРІР‚в„ўs design was won by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. A park on the northern fringe of the city above 59th Street was authorized by the Legislature in 1853. This rapid expansion of the city exacerbated the problems and deficiencies of the grid plan of 1811, with its meager provision for squares, promenades, or parks which would help to relieve the congestion resulting from the high density of urban building.Р”Р„s early as the 1840s a campaign was launched to create a large park to benefit all the citizens of New York. This growth, which roughly followed the march uptown of New YorkРІР‚в„ўs wealthy citizens and the transit lines, was channeled primarily to the East Side until it reached 59th Street. While Bloomingdale retained its rural atmosphere at mid-century, New York City was rapidly growing northward, due in large part to the impacts of the Industrial Revolution and massive immigration from Europe. Some fifty years elapsed, however, before streets in the historic district were begun to be laid out.

The austerity of this rigid grid plan was relieved only by Bloomingdale Road (now Broadway) which cut across it diagonally. In 1811, John Randel, Jr., an engineer, produced the Randel Survey, or CommissionersРІР‚в„ў Map, which imposed a uniform grid of broad avenues and narrow cross streets upon the rolling hills of Manhattan as far north as 155th Street. The state legislature appointed a commission in 1807 to prepare a plan for the orderly expansion of the city. After VandenheuvelРІР‚в„ўs death, the land was sold in 1827 to Francis Price, was surveyed, and subdivided into lots.Р”Р„lthough Bloomingdale remained largely rural until the late nineteenth century, its eventual development as an integral part of New York City had been planned much earlier in the century. By 1792 it had passed to ApthorpeРІР‚в„ўs daughter Charlotte and her (It remained until 1905 when the Apthorp was constructed by the Astors.) The land comprising the historic district, part of 'Bloomingale Farm,' was purchased by Stephen De Lancey by 1723, was passed to Oliver De Lancey in 1747, and was transferred to Charles W. In 1792, John Cornelius Vandenheuvel, former governor of Demerara, built his mansion on this site. The homestead of Stephen De Lancey was built before 1729 and was probably located on the site presently occupied by the Apthorp Apartments (a designated New York City Landmark), at Broadway between West 78th and 79th Streets. Gradually, wealthy New Yorkers began to establish country seats in the hinterland flanking Bloomingdale Road, including several in the vicinity of the historic district. In the early eighteenth century, Bloomingdale Road was opened through the area following the course of an old Indian trail and provided the main link to the city at the tip of Manhattan. The territory which compromises the historic district fell within lot eight and became the property of Egbert Wouterse. The tract was surveyed and subdivided among the patentees. Known as the 'thousand acre tract,' it was bounded roughly by the Hudson River and what are today 42nd Street, a point midway between 89th and 90th Streets, and Central Park West. In the 1660s, Governor Nicholls, the first English governor of New York, granted a large parcel of land in the Bloomingdale district to a syndicate of five patentees.

Prior to its urbanization the area was known as Bloomingdale, the appellation coming from the Dutch settlers of New Amsterdam who called it 'Bloemendael' in recollection of a flower-growing region of the same name near Haarlem, in Holland. Upper West Side, Manhattan, New York City, New York, United StatesР”Р„lthough its history can be traced as far back as the seventeenth century, the Upper West Side, including the land within the boundaries of the Riverside Drive-West 80th-81st Street Historic District, was still largely undeveloped until the 1880s.

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