An annual ranking of public park systems puts Charlotte near the bottom of the 100 largest US cities. The ParkScore Index from the Trust for Public Lands ranks Charlotte and Mecklenburg County 97th, based on spending, park acreage and other factors.
Charlotte scored well on median park size, at 18 acres — more than triple the average of all cities in the survey (5 acres). But the city ranked low in per-resident spending of $47, compared with the national average of $87.
And only 28 percent of residents live within a 10-minute walk of a park, compared with 70 percent nationally. The Trust for Public Lands is campaigning to get cities to adopt policies to ensure that all residents live within a 10-minute walk of a park.
The rankings also looked at the availability of basketball courts, dog parks, splash pads and other popular features.
Minneapolis, Saint Paul and Washington D.C. are the top-ranked cities.
See the ParkScore rankings at http://parkscore.tpl.org/, and the page detailing Charlotte-Mecklenburg's score here.
