Parking in a Popular Park

There has been a lot of talk lately about parking and traffic issues in Overton Park.  Because Overton Park Conservancy is committed to making the park welcoming for all its visitors, we’d like to take a moment to address those concerns.

Overton Park offers beautiful shady picnic areas, two playgrounds, a dog park, and miles of trails. The park is also fortunate to have so many cultural institutions all sharing space. Having a world-class zoo, art museum, art college, and performing arts facility all nestled within a beautiful park is a rare privilege, amounting to a treasure that’s uniquely Memphis.

Over time, as the park and its attractions have grown in popularity, it has become more difficult to accommodate all the cars entering the park.  On a nice day, every available street parking space might be claimed by noon, causing visitors to drive around looking for openings, which increases congestion. To accommodate more than one million visitors per year, the Zoo received permission from the City of Memphis to allow overflow parking on the park’s Greensward during busy days. This arrangement was made many years before the Conservancy was created to manage the park.

It’s not an ideal arrangement. That’s why, together with the Zoo and our other park partners, Overton Park Conservancy believes that the best solution is to add an additional zoo entrance (alleviating long lines of cars stacking up on Poplar and within the park) and build a parking deck on zoo property (alleviating overflow parking on the Greensward). A new garage, though more expensive than surface parking, will have the lowest impact on the park’s green space.  It can be located in an area that has a minimal impact on the surrounding neighborhoods, and can be designed in a way that makes it aesthetically pleasing. The only acceptable solution to the Conservancy is that parking on the Greensward ultimately comes to an end. We believe this can be accomplished while ensuring that the park and its attractions remain accessible to visitors from across the region.

This is a complex issue, and it will take a good deal of time and funds to get it right. It’s going to take time to raise millions of dollars for a parking garage, and in the meantime, the cars currently being parked on the Greensward will have to go somewhere. Any short-term plan for those cars has the potential for unintended consequences, which is why the Conservancy has been very cautious in its approach, exploring every possible solution that might provide relief either in part or in whole.  We want to ensure that any solutions represent good park design principles, while avoiding unintended negative impacts on the park experience, both for visitors and our neighbors.  Here are some of the solutions we have explored so far, in collaboration with the Memphis Zoo:

• We have tested and will continue to test shuttles to the park from nearby parking areas.  There are active plans to pilot shuttle service to the park from the new Overton Square garage beginning June 7.  The Zoo has agreed to financially support this service.
• We have hired a consultant to analyze whether any additional spaces could be added to existing parking areas in the park or within Zoo boundaries.
• We are improving access into the park for bicyclists, pedestrians and persons in wheelchairs, and all of our partners in the park are encouraging their members to access the park without their cars.
• We are exploring ways to add new parking areas, on North Parkway and inside the Zoo boundary on sites that could be more efficiently used.

We have been meeting regularly with representatives of the Zoo, the City of Memphis, and Citizens to Preserve Overton Park, which is advocating for immediate removal of cars from the Greensward.  Our goal is simple: to bring all sides together to discuss solutions that will meet everyone’s needs.  The Conservancy’s aim is to strengthen the entire park—and that includes our partners at the Zoo, Levitt Shell, Brooks Museum of Art, Memphis College of Art, and the Links at Overton Park. The best, most productive solution will be one that brings all those partners together around a shared vision for Overton Park.

The bottom line: everyone wants the same thing. Getting cars off the Greensward is a major priority for us, but we also recognize that it won’t happen overnight due to the logistics and cost involved in creating a permanent solution. We are asking for your patience as we work through the issue–and in the meantime, we hope you’ll consider visiting the park car-free. (May we suggest a ride through Bike Gate as a great place to start?)

We are so grateful for the passion people feel for the park, and we are always happy to hear from you. Feel free to contact us with your thoughts and concerns anytime. We’d also love to see you at our public meetings about improving bicycle and pedestrian access to the park on May 29 or May 31. Click here for details.