Mayor Gloria, city leaders cut ribbon on North Park Mini Park

SAN DIEGO (KUSI) – The city of San Diego officially opened the North Park Mini Park to residents in the North Park community at 10 a.m. Sunday with speeches from elected officials followed by a free community event.

The park is directly located behind the Observatory North Park and located on Granada Avenue and North Park Way.

Mayor Todd Gloria cut the ribbon on the new park, which was approved in 2012. He was joined by Assemblyman Chris Ward, D-San Diego and City Councilman Stephen Whitburn. Following the ribbon cutting were food trucks, a children’s music program and other live music.

The $5 million, 21,780-square-foot mini park and plaza transformed a parking lot behind the site of the former historic North Park Theatre — now known as the Observatory. Upgrades to the space include a musical play area, performance stage, seating areas with tables, chairs and benches, enhanced lighting, wayfinding pylons, bike racks, a drinking fountain and improved landscape and irrigation.

The park was approved a decade ago and the city began soliciting construction bids in 2019.

Two other mini parks were developed in San Diego in 2021: the La Paz Mini Park — which will transform a vacant dirt lot into green space in Valencia Park and is scheduled to be finished mid-2022 — broke ground in May; and the J Street Mini Park in the Stockton neighborhood was reopened in October following extensive improvements.

Last year, Gloria began the “Parks for All of Us” initiative, updating the city’s Parks Master Plan to prioritize park improvements in park- deficient and historically underserved communities, intended to help fund more projects like this in the future.

KUSI’s Teresa Sardina was live from the new North Park Mini Park with more details.