Memorial Park, Houston, Texas

Infobox park
park=Memorial Park

thumb|right|Memorial_Park
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type=Municipal (Houston, Texas)
location=Memorial, Houston
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size=1466 acres
opened=1924
operator=The Hermann Park Conservancy
annual visitors=
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Memorial Park, a municipal park in Houston, Texas, is one of the largest urban parks in the United States. Opened in 1924, the park covers approximately convert|1466|acre|km2|0 inside the 610 Loop, across from the neighborhood of Memorial. Memorial Drive runs through the park, heading east to downtown Houston and west to the 610 Loop. I-10 borders the park to the north. The park was originally designed by landscape architects Hare & Hare of Kansas City, Missouri.

From 1917 to 1923, the land where the park currently exists was the site of Camp Logan, a World War I US Army training camp. During wartime, the training camp was located on the far west boundaries of Houston. After the war in early 1924, Will and Mike Hogg, purchased convert|1503|acre|km2|0 of former Camp Logan land and sold the area to the city at cost. In May 1924, the City of Houston took ownership of the land to be used a "memorial" park dedicated to the memory to the soldiers who lost their life serving in World War I. The park is adjacent to the Camp Logan, Crestwood, and Rice Military neighborhoods.

The park includes the 18-hole Memorial Park Golf Course, Texas’s top-rated municipal golf course which opened in 1936. The course has a course rating of 73 and a slope rating of 122. The golf course was designed by John Bredemus. The course was renovated at the cost of $7 million in 1995.

The park also has facilities for tennis, softball, swimming, track, croquet, volleyball, skating, cycling and a three-mile (5 km) running course, and is very popular with Houston joggers. The park is also home to the Seymour Lieberman Exercise Trail, a three-mile (5 km) crushed granite pathway that sees almost 3 million visits annually.

On the south side of Memorial Drive, there are miles of multi-use trails through the woods, a 'picnic' loop which is used heavily by road cyclists, softball fields, sand volleyball courts and a field for playing rugby or soccer.

The Houston Arboretum and Nature Center, an arboretum and botanical garden, sits on convert|155|acre|km2|1 within the park. The Nature Center building was constructed in 1967.

ee also

External links

Official websites

* [http://www.houstontx.gov/abouthouston/exploringmemorial.html Memorial Park Official Website]
* [http://www.memorialparkconservancy.org/ Memorial Park Conservancy]
* [http://www.houstonarboretum.org/ Houston Arboretum and Nature Center]
* [http://www.houstontx.gov/municipalgolf/memorial/index.html Memorial Park Golf Course]

Maps, photos and aerial photos