Big Lake Trail Dedicated in New Orleans’ City Park

NEW ORLEANS, LA, 10/25/2009: The 50-acre Big Lake Trail and Meadow was dedicated Sunday afternoon in City Park, culminating an effort by The Trust for Public Land to restore an area which was badly damaged by Hurricane Katrina.

“Today, we celebrate the resiliency of this wonderful city. This will be a great place for people here to gather and enjoy the outdoors,” said Will Rogers, president of TPL, a national conservation organization.

Larry Schmidt, director of TPL’s New Orleans office and a native of the Crescent City, said, “City Park is one of our city’s best-loved spaces. In the future, I believe this will be one of the most popular parts of City Park.”

The Big Lake Trail and Meadow is at the southeast corner of City Park. TPL began the project two years ago and the $1.5 million project was supported through the generosity of hundreds of individual donations.

In addition, Schmidt noted, there was generous support from the Zemurray Foundation, the Coypu Foundation, the Boh Brothers Construction Company, the RosaMary Foundation, the Allstate Foundation, the Greater New Orleans Foundation, the Patrick F. Taylor Foundation, Entergy Corporation, Helis Foundation, Woldenberg Foundation, the Goldring Family Foundation, Coca-Cola, Wayne and Barbara Amedee, the Lester Kabacoff Family Foundation, the H. Eustis Reily Memorial Fund; Krebs, LaSalle, LeMieux Consulting Engineers; AstraZeneca; The American Heart Association, the Eugene and Joseph Jones Family Foundation, the Almar Foundation, the Lupo Family, Schrenk and Peterson Consulting Engineers, Sydney and Walda Besthoff, the Barriere Construction Company, and Regions Bank.

TPL, established in 1972, specializes in conservation real estate to protect land for people to enjoy as parks, greenways, community gardens, playgrounds and wilderness. TPL has protected more than 2 million acres across the country, and relies on the support of individuals, foundations, and corporations.