Tour Long Beach’s 0.05-acre ‘National Park’

The nation’s “smallest national park” is a 0.05-acre corner in Long Beach, California. 

As Erin Rode explains in an article for SF Gate, Bixby Knolls National Park — not an officially designated national park, to be clear — was the brainchild of Blair Cohn, executive director of the Bixby Knolls Business Improvement Association. 

“The park started out as a tiny piece of vacant and overgrown city property in Long Beach’s Bixby Knolls neighborhood, near one of the neighborhood’s major commercial corridors. Back in 2021, with redevelopment funding running out and the future of the association in question, the group decided to focus on ‘one last hurrah,’ Cohn said.” 

The group installed a small bridge and a mural that serve as the highlights of the park’s 0.01-mile hiking trail. “The improvement association added a variety of native plants with national park-like signs to the lot, and it commissioned wood-carved animals, including the ‘Bixby Bear.’”

When asked whether he’s concerned the park will run afoul of the real National Park Service, Cohn said, “They seem pretty busy right now.”