The Next Great (Sub)Urban Park?

At 1,300 acres, the Orange County Great Park, to be built over the ruins of the El Toro Marine base, may bring greater identity to the sprawling region.

1 minute read

January 26, 2006, 10:00 AM PST

By David Gest

Pundits are heralding the Orange County Great Park as New York's Central Park, San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, and Los Angeles's Griffith Park -- plus the cultural import of the region's Disneyland -- rolled into one.

"Officials in Orange County...selected a prominent New York landscape architect to design what will be one of the nation's largest urban parks, carved from runways of the closed El Toro Marine base."

"As part of his vision for the new park, he will create a lush canyon that plunges 70 feet deep and stretches more than two miles across a terrain he now describes as 'flat, featureless and uncomfortable.'"

"At the park's center, the planned canyon will widen to accommodate a lake, a lodge, hot-air balloons, an air museum and an amphitheater. Slabs of cracked concrete and abandoned buildings will be transformed into an oasis of woodlands and wetlands."

FULL STORY: N.Y. Design Team Chosen to Create a Showpiece O.C. Park

Tuesday, January 24, 2006 in The Los Angeles Times

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