Prater, Recreation area in Leopoldstadt, Austria
Prater is a recreation area in Leopoldstadt that stretches along the Danube Canal and includes a permanent amusement park as well as open green spaces. The grounds are crossed by long avenues that run through meadows and wooded patches, broken up by open squares in several places.
The Habsburgs used the grounds as a hunting reserve from 1560 and closed them to the public. At the end of the 18th century the park was opened for all Viennese and quickly developed into a popular destination.
The name Prater appears in a 1162 document, where Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa granted land called Pratum, Latin for meadow, to a nobleman named Conrad de Prato; his family later took the name Prater. Since 1890 the Hauptallee has hosted Vienna's first May Day march, held on 1 May 1890.
The park is freely accessible at all times and works well for long walks or bicycle rides on the flat paths. The amusement park rides usually open in March and close at the end of October, with each attraction paid separately.
The Hauptallee, the 4.4 km straight avenue cut through the floodplain forest in 1538, was where Austria's first May Day march took place on 1 May 1890. The Rotunde, a 108-metre-diameter dome built for the 1873 World Exposition, stood in the Prater until a fire destroyed it on 17 September 1937.
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