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Thursday, 09 September 2010 11:45

Written by Diana Nelson Jones

Schenley Park and Plaza in Oakland is the 46th most visited park in the country, with 1,750,000 visitors a year, and Point State Park Downtown is tied for 47th with 1,500,000.

These factoids come to you via the Trust for Public Land, which has released an urban parks report -- the 2010 City Park Facts report -- that’s as worrisome as everything else in this economy — that investment is not keeping up with inflation and staffing levels are down.

But the good news is that people LOVE them.

The report states: “Their usage dwarfs that of the national parks — the most popular major parks, such as Lincoln Park in Chicago receive upwards of 20 million users each year, and New York’s Central Park gets about 25 million visits annually — more than five times as many to the Grand Canyon.”

The entire report can be accessed at:

http://www.tpl.org/tier3_cd.cfm?content_item_id=20531&folder_id=3208

It advocates for parks as part of the urban infrastructure whose maintenance is as critical as any other.

“In this time of economic adversity, we need great city parks to keep the hearts of our communities beating,” said Peter Harnik, director of the Center. “These are the publicly available places city dwellers can go to enjoy the outdoors, stay in shape, and recharge their souls.”

The report lists the oldest parks, the largest and most visited among its statistics. Pittsburgh does not have any of the 100 largest. Neither does Huntington, W.Va., but the photo here was taken in that river city's lovely Ritter Park.

The oldest is Plaza de la Constitution in St. Augustine, Fla. circa 1573. Boston Common and New Haven Green fill out the top three oldest (not including what were exclusively native American sites, wouldn't you know.)

More report: Harnik notes that large cities spent $5.8 billion on their park systems and recreation programs in 2008, but they also collectively suffer from at least $6.4 billion in additional deferred repairs and improvements.

The report includes statistics on acreage, spending, staffing, and facilities. The parks under study serve 58 million urban residents, have 11,160 playgrounds, 9,167 baseball diamonds, 1,349 swimming pools, 514 dog parks and 400 public golf courses.

The photo here is of a sculpture of girls dancing in a circle at the botanical gardens in New York's Central Park.

The report continues: “Cities that provide particularly large amounts of parkland per 1,000 residents include New Orleans, Virginia Beach, Albuquerque, Scottsdale, and Jacksonville,” the report continues. “Older, more densely populated cities that provide residents with big swaths of green space include St. Paul, Minneapolis, Washington, D.C., and Pittsburgh. Anchorage, Alaska offers the most parkland, with the gargantuan Chugach State Park inside its municipal borders.

Based on data from 2008 — the most recent the trust has compiled, the best-funded major city park and recreation departments were in Washington, D.C. ($259 per resident), Seattle ($252), Scottsdale ($214), Las Vegas ($206), and New Orleans ($205).

Pittsburgh spends $88 per resident, which is middlin'. We're spending more than lots of cities that include Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Miami, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Indianapolis, Cleveland and Columbus.

The least-funded departments were in Detroit ($26 per resident), El Paso ($31), Memphis ($34), Jacksonville ($35), and Houston ($36).

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written by mytravel, July 29, 2011 - 06:51 AM

If Schenley Park and Plaza in Oakland is the 46th most visited park in the country,then I also want to visit this place at least once. I always like to travel and live within natural beauty and therefore in my all travel vacations. I have visit at least one national park or wildlife sanctuary which places are very close with the nature and I will get the comfort after visit this places. Last time I had visit Nameri Wildlife Sanctuary which is the most famous wildlife sanctuary in Assam, India

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