Dallas’ Klyde Warren Park has proven to be so successful, that a second-deck park is now in the works a few miles to the south.
Funding was set aside last month to build a deck park over Interstate 35E in the area around the Dallas Zoo, between South Marsalis and South Ewing avenues. The money — $50 million — would cover an estimated 80 percent of the total cost, according to a representative of the North Central Texas Council of Governments.
The funding approval comes as the Texas Department of Transportation is doling out $1.3 billion to the state’s biggest cities — Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, Austin and Fort Worth — for traffic congestion relief. Nearly half of the money is bound for the Dallas-Fort Worth area, with $364 million coming to the Dallas side according to figures released by the NCTCOG.
The deck park would be built in conjunction with the I-35E Southern Gateway Project, the purpose of which “is to improve safety, congestion relief, traffic operations, address roadway deficiencies, and improve system linkage,” according to TxDOT.
In the area of I-35E around the zoo, the highway will be widened from 8 to 10 lanes and the deck park would be built over the top.
The area of north Oak Cliff on the west side of the highway has seen significant investment in recent months, but the area that fronts the freeway has not received the same lift.
A citizens group that has backed the proposal for the better part of a year is hopeful a new park could do for that area what Klyde Warren Park has already done — encourage new development and business in an area that was once unfriendly to pedestrians.
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The deck park project is slated to go to bid in 2017, according to NCTCOG public involvement manager Amanda Wilson, with completion set for summer of 2021.
