While New York City may have dodged a bullet from Tropical Storm Irene, its trees did not. From shade trees on side streets in Elmhurst, Queens, to towering tulip trees in Prospect Park in Brooklyn, many toppled, snapped or splintered.

The parks department estimated that 1,200 to 1,500 trees on the city’s streets were knocked down, and thousands of others were damaged. In addition, at least 1,000 trees in the city’s 1,700 parks were destroyed, but the tally has yet to be completed. Since Sunday, the city has received about 9,000 storm-related calls about trees.

The storm also caused beach erosion on Staten Island and boardwalk damage along Rockaway Beach in Queens. And playgrounds up and down the Bronx River were flooded, their safety mats floating away from the play equipment.

But trees took the biggest hit. “It was an equal opportunity storm,” said Christian Zimmerman, a landscape architect who is vice president for design and construction of the Prospect Park Alliance, a nonprofit group that manages the park with the city.