I’ve never heard a good answer for this one, but most people agree that it’s an odd fact.
The street that borders the west side of Central Park is called “Central Park West”. The street that borders the south side of Central Park is called “Central Park South”. However, on the east side, the street borders Central Park is “Fifth Avenue.” “Park Avenue” (which is what I would expect to border the park) is another couple of blocks over.
Why doesn’t Central Park extend over to Park Avenue and where did Park Avenue get its name from (it clearly does not border Central Park)?
Park Avenue actually has nothing to do with Central Park. It was originally Fourth Avenue. It is also the avenue that the trains leaving from Grand Central Station run under. When the tracks were set underground and covered over, Park Avenue was reconstructed with a median divider that was landscaped. They renamed the avenue Park Avenue because of this park-like median (and because it sounded better).
Renaming Fifth Ave. would be even less successful than reanming Sixth Ave. Do they honestly expect anyone to ever actually call it the Avenue of the Americas? Why do they even bother? Park Ave. probably only succeeded because it’s easy to say, and makes selling property easy. Anyone know when they put the tracks underneath, by the way?
Fifth Avenue was laid out in, I believe, 1825, so it was already well-establihed long before Fourth Avenue became Park. By the way, the measly little medians on Park nowadays are a pathetic reminder of what they used to be. The street was widened for cars in the mid-20th century, and the once-lovely medians (which used to have trees, benches and all) were narrowed to tiny strips.
By the way, Park is still called Fourth down in the Village, beklow Washington Square. And Saxface, who works on “Avenue of the Americas,” assures memail will arrive if addressed to Sixth Avenue.