Decades after Camden County began planning its parks, the system’s urban core is being reimagined and expanded to enable people on foot, bicycles, or watercraft to enjoy the Cooper and Delaware Rivers.
- Gateway Park, created for the 2000 Republican National Convention and locked in limbo ever since, is finally set to debut along the Cooper on the south side of Admiral Wilson Boulevard. The park is expected to be open this spring.
- Meanwhile, Riverfront State Prison, long a hulking barrier between much of North Camden and the Delaware, has been replaced by the new Cooper’s Point Park.
- East and north of Pyne Point in the city’s Cramer Hill section, a $25 million state project announced by the Department of Environmental Protection in 2017 will transform the long-abandoned Harrison Avenue landfill into a 62-acre waterfront park.
- And a bit farther north, Petty’s Island is on track for conversion into a more than 400-acre urban nature preserve within the next five years.
“We’ve rediscovered something, and we’re talking about a ‘return to the river’ campaign," said Maggie McCann Johns, director of the Camden County Parks Department.
