Park Fit NYC: Asser Levy Playground

About the ParkFit Project

About two summers ago, as I became interested in body-weight/calisthenic fitness I found that New York City lacks an accurate list of its park-based fitness inventory. Performing cursory web searches in the hope of finding a new pull up bar or set of parallel bars may bring you an article here or there about a particular spot, but as of the present moment there is no place to find a comprehensive source compilation of locations.

Through my readings, wanderings and conversations I have begun to find a number of these sites throughout the city and will be documenting them through this blog. My goal is to primarily document park-based workout spots and fitness equipment. All locations will be added as pins to the Google Map contained on the site. I will also add my knowledge of running tracks and other outdoor workout spots that I deem relevant. Information garnered from assorted websites may be used to further provide information to my readers.

While I hope that at some point this site will host a comprehensive review of all outdoor fitness equipment in the city, at the present time the information contained herein will be limited to my personal knowledge which admittedly contains a strict geographic bias to Manhattan. I most certainly welcome all emails and will happily post new verifiable information as it is provided to me.

To health, fitness and pushing limits,

- The Skyhopper

Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Asser Levy Playground

Riding my bicycle up Manhattan's eastern edges I stumbled upon a compact yet useful workout station in Asser Levy playground on 23rd street. Well hidden behind the handball courts and right next to the FDR drive on the north eastern side of the park lies a small yet elegant muscle-inducing device.

Frontal view

While I must admit that the style and colors of the equipment are quite corny indeed, the equipment has everything you need for a full upper body workout. As you can see from the pictures, there are two benches, one decline and one flat. There are also two pull up bars suspended from the sides of the unit. A yellow set of parallel bars lies to the rear of the unit.

Rear view

At the time of my visit the park was undergoing quite a bit of construction and it appears there may be many changes in the works. Visit this link for an idea of what may be in-store for Asser Levy Playground in the future.