A neighbor's guide to Kenwood Park, the 'Choo Choo' park

The heart of the neighborhood

Tucked among the Chain of Lakes and a few miles from downtown, Kenwood Park is the green center of its namesake neighborhood, big enough, the neighborhood organization notes, to hold the many families and friends who gather there. It is the kind of park that functions as a shared backyard for the blocks around it, busy in every season.

Locals know it as the 'Choo Choo' park, a nickname earned by the train-themed playground that generations of Kenwood children have grown up on. The park pulls double duty year-round: tennis courts and pickup sports in the warm months, and one of the area's favorite sledding hills once the snow flies.

What you'll find there

Beyond the playground, Kenwood Park offers tennis courts and open space for pickup games, walking paths, and the Kenwood Community Center, which anchors the recreation programming, youth activities, classes and seasonal camps, that the neighborhood and its funding partners support. The center is also the meeting place for the Kenwood Neighborhood Organization, making the park a civic hub as much as a recreational one.

The park's appeal is partly its setting. Sitting close to Lake of the Isles and the rest of the chain, it is woven into the larger network of green space and trails that defines the lake district, so a trip to the park easily extends into a walk along the water.

Every neighborhood needs a 'Choo Choo' park: the place where the whole block's childhood happens, summer games and winter sledding alike.— LowryHillNews

A park kept up by a system

Kenwood Park's reliable upkeep is no accident. It benefits from the city's 20-Year Neighborhood Park Plan, which funds maintenance and rehabilitation, and from periodic county youth grants that pay for programming. The Park Board owns and runs it; the neighborhood organization advocates for it. That layered support is why a park this heavily used stays in good shape.

It also means the park is a fair barometer of the neighborhood's civic health: a well-kept, well-programmed Kenwood Park reflects the public investment and volunteer attention flowing into it.

A park for every season

What makes Kenwood Park beloved is that it never really closes for the year. Summer brings tennis, pickup games and the train-themed playground; autumn fills the paths with walkers; and the first heavy snow turns the hill into one of the most popular sledding runs in the lake district. Few neighborhood parks earn that kind of year-round loyalty, and it is a big part of why residents treat Kenwood Park as the neighborhood's living room.