I'm not sure I buy the 'rich fucking over the poor' argument.  I know that the 'reasons' for building something like this can change over time, but the stated reasons at the time for building Central Park (and Prospect Park and Van Cortlandt) were kinda driven by a Thoreau-ian view of 'getting back to nature' being key to good health. You have to remember that NYC in the 1850 was disgusting, cramped, dirty and swimming in horseshit.  

The mega-parks weren't for the 'rich' as the rich had homes upstate and out on Long Island to escape the shittiness of the city.  Central Park was an attempt to bring 'nature' to the masses in the city that *couldn't* get out of town, so common people could get out of the 'bad air' of mid/downtown. Also poor people used to escape the heat of their tenement buildings by sleeping in the park by the thousands in the summertime.

Also keep in mind that the UES/UWS at the time weren't 'nice' - no wealthy people lived there.  They were partly shanties and partly farms (it was the construction of CP that made these areas desirable after the fact). This top (broadway &amp; 84th) pic is the[ absolute heart of the UWS today](https://www.businessinsider.com/manhattan-nyc-farmland-photos-2017-6), and taken in 1879, about 10yrs after CP was built; scroll down to see a few other pics. My point is that the people that benefitted from having an adjacent park were not the rich people.  The UES didn't become 'nice' until the 1900s and the UWS developed in the 1920s.