William H Seward Park

Lower East Side in Chinatown Manhattan here lies a park where children laugh, slide down on a slide, swing, and enjoy the moment as children. It sits nearby the F train at East Broadway station. Often times in the warm months, weather permitting, loud Chinese music is blaring to Chinese women dancing. I have not seen any traditional Chinese ribbon dance held here as I yearn of whirling long strips of silk through the air for a ribbon dance or elderly men and women performing Tai Chi. I have seen neither happening at Seward Park.

Great park! Nice and relaxing with plenty of space. Awesome place to sit on a cool summer day. Other than the loud Chinese music, it’s pretty peaceful!

Plenty of people playing and just hanging out this beautiful Sunday. Went through for a walk and saw folks meditating, kids playing, and people relaxing. It’s clean and green.

Small park on the edge of Chinatown. Plenty of benches and a childrens play area. Park is right besode the Seward libary. Average NY park but nice to just sit and relax when you need to get off the city streets.

Contained park, verging on dirtiness but the users look happy. Many Asian women dancing to music. Old men sitting under trees.

William H Seward Park is not named after the great man who thought convincing Andrew Johnson to purchase Alaska from the Russians would be a good idea.
It is also not a great place to bring your kids if you live in the LES.
It is also definitely not a great place for a Chinese youth volleyball team that has one token white girl to practice last-​man-​ups on a hot Saturday afternoon.
I also wouldn’t recommend holding a birthday party and inviting twenty or so of your friends to eat delicious Cantonese-​style duck and BBQ chicken, and you definitely, definitely don’t want to pretend to not drink in public because none of the condescending Chinese ladies watching their children play here will care.
My whole life up to this point has been a lie.

Stopped here after Doughnut Plant on my way to the East River Park. Not my cup of tea, but families were playing with their kids and older kids walking through. A nice refuge amidst the commotion but not worth my time.

Three giant rats, three giant rats,
See how they run, see how they run,
They all ran after the …
I went to sit at my usual bench in the shade to read and relax when I see 3 giant rats (i’m talking the size of porcupines) and a smaller baby rat (no, not cute) hanging out in plain sight amongst all the people. apparently the rats had also come to the park bench to read and relax. they were just lounging and cavorting on the bench, bouncing in and out of the trash can, having a good old time. near all the kids playing and folks enjoying the sunny day. so unbearably repulsive.
so i will be reading in a different park for sure. and calling 311.

Lots of older Chinese women and men doing AM tai chi exercises, kids of various stripes, especially Chinese-​American, places to sit, stand, exercise…
Next to the recently renovated Seward Park branch of the NY Public Library.

This gem of a park is tucked away in the heart of the Lower East Side. During the week in the summer months the park is quiet with lots of natural shade, which makes it the perfect place to read the paper or sit and have lunch. One of the things I like most about Seward Park are the tennis courts on the Essex st. side of the park. There are about 4 courts lined up next to each other and on the weekends the local kids really take a lot of liberties with the standard rules of tennis. Trying to play a normal game is like entering the Tennis Twilight Zone. Kids are yelling, tennis balls are flying in all sorts of directions, there are no less the 6 kids playing on one half of a tennis court, the 39 kids playing basketball with two balls on half a basketball court keep you on your toes with wayward basketballs, and that’s before the place gets packed. The court is situated in such a way that if a tennis ball gets by you, its just as likely to hit the fence as it is to roll out into the street. On the other hand, there is no parks department employee asking to see your tennis permit and or telling you your tennis time is up. Hooray for Twilight Zone Tennis/​Basketball courts.