Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates Inc

City Park 2050

The City Park Master Plan establishes a framework for preserving and guiding the future of New Orleans’ oldest public park, a 1,300-acre oasis in the heart of the city. Developed by MVVA and our multidisciplinary team over the course of two years, the project was initiated at a pivotal governance moment for the park where responsibility for the day-to-day operations, as well as fundraising and revenue, was placed in the hands of a newly established City Park Conservancy. The Plan provides guidance for this transition in two major areas: “Foundational Planning,” focused on improving the essential elements that keep a park healthy and support all visitors, and “Placemaking Planning,” which looks at enhancing the spaces people already love while creating new places to enjoy.

Proposed Festival Grounds at Reunion Shelter

Community Engagement has been at the core of the City Park 2050 planning process. In addition to seven community-wide public meetings, the MVVA Team held multiple sessions with park-based organizations, such as sports teams, GrowDat, and the Botanical Garden. To reach out to a group that was underrepresented in the park, the team established the Ideas Youth Committee: a group of teens and young adults from community organizations and educational institutions throughout New Orleans. The team also created a Community Fellows program to expand outreach and secure involvement from across the city.

Recurring meetings with a Technical Advisory Panel and the Master Planning Committee shed light on the plan’s overall development, while surveys, activities, and pop-up engagement sessions deepened opportunities to enrich the park’s future.

City Park Functional Planning (left) and Placemaking Planning (right)

A guiding principle of the Plan was to avoid making single purpose recommendations. Instead, recommendations propose integrated solutions that address multiple issues and synthesize key outcomes of Foundational Planning and Placemaking Planning to enrich and create memorable places for new Park experiences that support all visitors and function as part of the larger park systems that keep City Park healthy.

Foundational Planning addresses the core systems that sustain a healthy park and ensure a positive experience for all visitors. It considers park-wide operations—maintenance, revenue, hydrology and water quality, landscape resilience, connectivity and wayfinding, and visitor services—and provides recommendations that respond to broader priorities of environmental health, affordability, economic development, and community growth.

Vehicular Network Recommendations—the Plan proposes targeted roadway reductions and removals to open new opportunities for safe movement for cyclists and pedestrians between all areas of the Park

Bicycle and Pedestrian Network Recommendations—the Plan proposes a hierarchy of path types that can support different ways of experiencing the Park, from direct and efficient connectivity to more immersive and intimate moments in nature.

Spending time in City Park—the Plan recognizes gaps in visitor support infrastructure and identified opportunities for improvement through enhancing existing offerings, repurposing underutilized buildings to provide these and new services, or building new structures if needed.

Opportunities for Shoreline Improvements

The Plan outlines a strategy to restore declining areas of the Park by improving lagoon water quality through sediment removal, stabilizing eroded edges with vegetated buffers that enhance filtration and storage, and introducing greater landscape diversity in low-lying areas with wetland gardens and meadows. It also proposes widening select lagoon connections to strengthen water circulation and adopting best practices in lawn maintenance to support long-term ecological health.

Placemaking Planning considers City Park at the scale of the spaces where visitors actually experience it. This people-centered approach emphasizes the landscapes that shape activities and memories—whether organized events like sports games and concerts or spontaneous moments such as pausing at a quiet lagoon for reflection or gathering with friends beneath the shade of a large oak. At its core, Placemaking focuses on creating settings that support both programmed uses and everyday joy.

One of the more transformative recommendations is to overcome the major barrier posed by the interstate highway bisecting the park. While the park is dearly loved, park users can’t move from one destination to another without leaving it first. New landmark features such as an art installation on the underside of the highway, a major pedestrian entry featuring a civic water feature, and a panoramic viewing platform called the “treehouse” create a coherent armature of new destinations for understanding the whole of the landscape.

Community feedback emphasized the importance of enhancing and connecting the Park’s natural spaces. The Plan responds by linking areas like Couturie Forest and the Wisner Tract through selective roadway reductions, improved trails, and new lagoon crossings, while restoring native landscapes and adding visitor amenities. The result will be a 165-acre destination that showcases Louisiana’s ecosystems and supports both wildlife and public enjoyment.

Diagram illustrating the concept of expanding the Nature Landing

The Park’s athletic facilities are heavily used by schools and recreational leagues, leading to wear and deterioration. With regional sports trends shifting toward flexible, multi-use spaces, the Plan recommends upgrading existing fields and expanding offerings with an additional multi-use field and new sports courts.

The Plan prioritizes reconnecting the two halves of City Park divided by I-610 and the railroad, so the Park can function as a cohesive whole. Existing underpasses are narrow and vehicle-oriented, despite their proximity to key community destinations such as Pan American Stadium and Grow Dat Youth Farm. The Plan recommends redesigning these crossings to improve safety, visibility, and wayfinding for all users, while also exploring opportunities to transform them into memorable gateways through temporary artistic lighting.

On the west side of City Park, three WPA-era landmarks—Tad Gormley Stadium, Roosevelt Mall, and Popp Fountain—stand out as civic icons but are constrained by fencing, traffic, limited pedestrian and bike access, and overused athletic facilities. The Plan envisions revitalizing these spaces by upgrading the Stadium, creating gardens around Popp Fountain, and activating Roosevelt Mall as a social and cultural hub, restoring their role as vibrant civic destinations.

The east side of City Park, defined by lawns, shade trees, and trails around Big Lake and the Festival Grounds, is popular but struggles with poor conditions after wet weather. In response to community input, the Plan recommends diversifying this landscape by embracing its natural wet and dry conditions and adjusting maintenance practices to better support both daily use and large events.

The historic live oaks along City Park Avenue and Bayou Metairie create one of the Park’s most iconic landscapes, but increasing destinations and vehicular infrastructure have left the area feeling congested. The Plan recommends enhancing Dreyfous Meadow as a key link between Bayou Metairie and the Big Lake trail network, and reimagining the Marconi Park entrance as a welcoming, pedestrian-focused civic space anchored by a new water feature.