Kevin Canfield
Tulsa World Reporter
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For years, Johnson Park, at the corner of 61st Street and Riverside Drive, has been best known as the city’s dumping ground for green waste after storms blow through town.
The basketball courts are popular, the playground nothing special. Occasionally, a fireworks show or other event will draw a large crowd, but those are rare. More often than not, the 33-acre expanse is underutilized.
That’s about to change — or so city officials are betting.
After decades of proposals, plans and promises, the park is getting a major overhaul. More than $8 million in Improve Our Tulsa 2 and IOT 3 funding will be spent over the next year and a half to add a lighted walking trail, pickleball courts, a covered basketball court, a skate feature, a splash pad, and a large playground. Construction is expected to begin in early 2026 and be completed in about a year.
“It’ll be a destination park,” said Parks Director Anna America.
Plans also call for adding more parking, trees and lighting, as well as secure restrooms.
America may be most excited about the dog park, and not just because she believes it will be the best dog park in the city. How it came to be, she said, was a good reminder that when designing a park, the best thing the city can do is listen to the people who will be using it.
During the meetings the city had to learn what amenities neighborhood residents’ wanted in the park, America noticed “dog park” was always at or near the top of the list, so she asked one of the attendees why she had ranked it so high.
“She lived in the apartments nearby,” America said. “She had two kids, and I said, ‘Why did you pick dog park as your number one?’ and she said, ‘Because I want my kids to be able to have a dog.’ …
“She doesn’t have the luxury of having a yard and a way to do that, and having a dog park in the park across the street is what she believes would allow her to give her kids that same kind of experience that I give my kids in a different neighborhood. … It’s easy to design a park with the best intentions possible, really trying to serve people, and not actually knowing what they need and want.”
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Proposals to revive the park have come and gone over the past 15 years. In 2011, a local businessman proposed a privately funded sports complex that would have included fields for rugby, soccer, football and lacrosse, as well as basketball courts, playgrounds and a water park. It never got off the ground.
Historically, the 61st Street and Peoria Avenue corridor has been an area of high crime, particularly in the apartment complexes that populate the neighborhood.
But police, city officials and nonprofits continue to work to improve the quality of life there. A revitalized Johnson Park has long been seen as key to that effort, with former City Councilors Jeannie Cue and Jayme Fowler having spent years advocating for funding for improvements.
First-term District 9 City Councilor Carol Bush has continued to advocate for the park improvements.
“I am very excited to finally see progress happening in Johnson Park,” Bush said. “The community has been waiting a long time for the revitalization of the park, and we all look forward to seeing it come to fruition.”
America said accessibility is another key feature of the park design. The new, larger playground, for example, will be an inclusive one, meaning it will be accessible to all children, including those with disabilities.
“We really try to think about that all the way through the park as we talk about where do we put the benches and things like that,” America said.
The primary reason it took the the city so long to make the park improvements was a lack of funding. After voters in 2019 approved $3.125 million for the park in IOT 2, it became clear that more money was needed to build what neighborhood residents envisioned for the site. So in 2023 voters approved another $5 million for the project as part of IOT 3.
“This is something I know people have been talking about for a long time, but nobody got it on a funding package and made sure we got money for it,” America said.
The city expects to bid the project in October. Should bids come back higher than expected, America said, she will do everything in her power to ensure that all of the improvements envisioned are completed.
“I am prepared to go out and look and see if I can find private funding,” she said. “So if anybody who reads this story wants to be a part of supporting this park, this is a great opportunity. It’s going to be a high-profile park, very visible. It’s going to serve an incredibly important community need, and we have an opportunity to really be an example on how you can do this.”
kevin.canfield@
tulsaworld.com
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Kevin Canfield
Tulsa World Reporter
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