Henrietta Lacks Educational Park: Turning Overgrown Land into a Modern, Vibrant Park

The Challenge: Restore an invisible park forgotten by time

This lot was overgrown with weeds, littered with trash and broken asphalt, and primarily served as a dumping ground. It was in close proximity to a neighborhood school and adjacent to a community pool, yet had no open sight lines, prompting even students to walk the long way around the park due to safety concerns. 

Through research, community members found that this space was actually a Baltimore City park — then known as Ambrose Kennedy Park — that had been so badly neglected for years that it wasn’t receiving basic services like trash pickup and safety management.

A community in action!

Led by ReBuild Johnston Square and supported by BUILD (Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development) and the 6th Branch, the community came together to develop a park campaign, that included bi-weekly park clean-ups.

But even with their thousands of hours of labor, they needed more support. They became frustrated at the lack of municipal investment in the park’s upkeep, and realized that clean-ups were only scratching the surface of their needs. 

The Vision: Transform the park piece by piece to see what works

The community began to consistently maintain the park and had a vision to create a safe, modern park facility. The Neighborhood Design Center joined the effort by guiding tactical urbanism interventions that allowed the neighborhood leaders to test ideas, iterate, and make gradual changes that improved the function and perception of the park. 

The group also implemented a series of changes, such as cleaning up and repainting the basketball courts, building small playground items like balance beams and tire climbers, creating murals with local artists and youth, painting signage indicating the community values and aspirations, removing dysfunctional fencing, removing invasive scrub trees, removing old asphalt, and planting trees.

The Plan: Secure Funding

NDC’s support, combined with the community-implemented changes, grabbed the attention of the Baltimore City Department of Recreation and Parks, which applied and won a highly competitive National Recreation and Parks Association Great grant totaling $1.3 million.

The Build: Take the previous tactical urbanism interventions to the next level 

Now, the new park could level up to include a splash pad and boulder area, seating areas, stormwater best management practices, native trees and landscaping, bathrooms, and play areas.

The community then decided to rename the park to cement its standing as a space created for and by the community. The park was renamed Henrietta Lacks Educational Park, paying tribute to Lacks’ legacy and status as a heroine in the surrounding predominantly Black community the park serves. 

The Future: Include new features and expand this catalyst for change

The park has been transformed from a neglected dumping ground to a space where on any given day, thirty or more people can be found using the basketball court and surrounding park facilities. More funding has been leveraged to begin phase two of the park’s renovations. Future plans include adding a skate park feature, extending the park to include land where formerly abandoned houses have been torn down and adding a brand new pool.  

If you were a part of this project please reach out to Briony at bhynson@ndc-md.org so we can include your contribution.

Read about more projects we’ve partnered on in the Johnston Square neighborhood.

This case study was last updated August 2024.