New Orleans could create the largest stretch of public riverfront in the U.S., thanks to a public land swap.
A vision to develop a contiguous public parkway along the New Orleans riverfront originated in the 2008 Reinventing the Crescent plan. Now, a missing piece of the proposed stretch of land has become available through an agreement between the Port of New Orleans and the Public Belt Railroad to trade riverfront properties. Jackson Rollings writes in the Architect's Newspaper:
In the swap, PNO took ownership of a stretch of railroad along the Mississippi River and PBR took ownership of two large wharves–Esplanade Avenue and Governor Nicholls Street Wharves. PBR is owned by the City of New Orleans, which now plans to redevelop both wharves as public space (à la Mandeville Wharf). This redevelopment will connect two existing riverfront parks, Bywater’s Crescent Park and the French Quarter’s Woldenburg Park.
The new park is one of several major redevelopments slated for the Mississippi River waterfront, coming to hundreds of millions of dollars. The city began a resurgence of park-building activity in 2014.
FULL STORY: New Orleans property swap may yield largest public riverfront in the U.S.
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Journal of the American Planning Association