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City Park Conservancy (CPC) has decided to extend the Master Planning process in order to engage more Park users and members of the Greater New Orleans region and incorporate more of their feedback and ideas into the planning process. As such, the Park will postpone Public Meeting #4 until a number of these concepts can be synthesized and articulated in planning materials.
“While we have made great strides in the current planning process and talked to so many individuals and stakeholders, we are continuing to listen to public feedback and further deepening our outreach to the community at large. This extension will help us do that,” said City Park Conservancy President and CEO, Cara Lambright.
“We also want to take more time developing the concepts that have resonated with the public – more playgrounds, especially at the entrances and nearer to neighborhood access points; improving health of the lagoons and increasing stormwater storage; telling the Park’s history, more trails; redesigning roadways to make them safer and fewer in number; rehabilitating the assets we currently have – such as Tad Gormley and our sport fields – and restoring the ecological health of the Park.”
The Master Planning process has not yet reached the halfway period and CPC and its Master Planning Design Team are still receiving feedback and talking to Park partners and stakeholders from across the Greater New Orleans area every day.
“We are open to hearing ideas, and we are flexible to making adjustments,” said City Park Chief Planning Officer Randy Odinet. “This is what a planning process is, and we are fulfilling our promise to listen to the Park, the public and experts in the field to help inform this long-term plan for the Park’s continued preservation and evolution.”
During the extension period, CPC and the Master Planning Design Team have arranged several meetings with city neighborhood and community representatives and active user groups within the Park. The purpose of these meetings is to continue to gain comprehensive insight into their needs and desires and to hear about existing Park conditions that may be adversely affecting them.
Most notably, CPC is launching an Ideas Youth Committee, born out of conversations with teens who said they felt there wasn’t a space for them in the Park. The Park is currently in the process of recruiting for this committee which is scheduled to take place from summer to mid-fall.
The City Park Master Plan is made possible through a lead gift from the Greg Keller Foundation. For more information on the Master Planning process, click here.