City Park, New Orleans

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City Park in New Orleans. Photo courtesy of Geoff Boeing

City Park, a 1300-acre (5.3 km²) public park in New Orleans, Louisiana, is the 6th-largest and 7th-most-visited park in the United States.^[1] Although it is an urban park, it is operated by a state agency, the Louisiana Department of Recreation and Tourism. The Park is very unusual in that it is 98% funded by self-generated revenue through user fees and donations, 2% by the state of Louisiana. ^[2]

1 Facilities
2 History
3 External links
4 References

[edit] Facilities

City Park has dozens of attractions that touch the lives of nearly every Greater New Orleans resident. Several of these facilities are currently closed pending repairs from Hurricane Katrina.

The Amusement Park featuring a miniature train ride, roller coaster, several flat rides, and one of the few remaining antique, carved wooden carousels in the country. The carousel is 100 years old in 2006.
Storyland – A children’s fairy tale theme park features twenty-six larger than life storybook exhibits for kids to climb on, slide down or pretend to be their favorite character within.
New Orleans Botanical Garden – A lush 13-acre site containing a large collection of temperate, tropical, and semitropical plants. The Garden is also home to the New Orleans Historic Train Garden, a G-scale model railroad exhibit with houses representing the various neighborhoods of the city recreated in twigs, bark, and other plant parts.
Celebration in the Oaks – A popular holiday light and entertainment extravaganza that generates 13 percent of the park’s annual operating budget.
New Orleans Museum of Art – The New Orleans Museum of Art is considered one of the finest museums in the South.
Sidney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden – Opened in 2003, the Besthoff Sculpture garden features over 30 works of world-renowned sculptures in a beautifully landscaped area featuring mature live oak trees.
Weddings & Catering – Venues within the park host hundreds of weddings and other functions throughout the year. The park is the largest non-hotel caterer in the City.
Historic Structures – The Peristyle, Popp Bandstand, The Casino Building and Popp Fountain were constructed between 1907 and 1917.
Bayou Oaks Golf Courses – The Park boasts three 18-hole golf courses, one of which was once home to the city’s PGA tournament.
Bayou Oaks Driving Range – A 100-tee, double decker driving range.
Softball and Soccer – The park more than a dozen softball and soccer fields.
Stadiums – Tad Gormley Stadium seats 26,500 and was built by the Works Progress Administration. It was renovated for the 1992 US Olympic Track and Field Trials and in July of 2005, was home to the Jr. Olympics track and field competitions. Pan American Stadium, a 5,000 seat stadium is the home of many high school footballs games.
Track – The 400-meter, international track was designed as a practice track for the 1992 US Olympic Track & Field Trails.
Tennis – The City Park Tennis Center, featuring rubico and hard courts, is one of the largest municipal tennis facilities in the South.
Boating and Fishing – The Park features 11 miles of lagoons, lakes and Bayou’s stocked with a wide variety of fish including bass.
Horse Stables – Equest Farms offers boarding for horses and equestrian lessons. The park also houses the stables for the Sheriff and his horses.

[edit] History

City Park was established in the 19th century on the land fronting Metairie Road (now City Park Avenue) along the remains of Bayou Metairie, a former distributary of the Mississippi River, but originally only went back a block or two in distance, as swamp ground extended from there to Lake Pontchartrain. After this area was drained in the mid 20th century, City Park was expanded.^[3] Substantial improvements were made to the park by the Works Progress Administration, including many sculptures by Enrique Alferez. It is one of the 10 largest urban parks in the country and holds the world's largest collection of mature live oak trees in the world, some older than 600 years. Its founding in 1853 makes also makes it one of the oldest parks in the country.

Hurricane Katrina did extensive damage to the park, first by the winds toppling an estimated 1,000 trees and damaging many more. After the failure of several floodwalls, the park flooded with 1 to 10 feet of water which sat for two to four weeks, damaging all buildings, amusement rides, maintenance equipment, electrical systems, vehicles, and causing the death of more trees and landscaping including nearly the entire plant collection in the New Orleans Botanical Garden.