Across the US, over 100 million people do not have access to a park within a 10-minute walk of their home. The ParkServe® mapping platform empowers users to plan and advocate for new local parks to help close this gap in park access. This publicly accessible mapping site is based on a comprehensive parks database for 14,000 cities and towns across the country. Users can view parks, their 10-minute walk service areas, as well as the neighborhoods that do not enjoy access to a close-to-home public park. Health, equity, climate, and environmental metrics are used to prioritize where new parks are needed first. 

Planners and community members can use the ParkServe mapping platform to influence decisions about parks. This should also include what is available inside the parks! Last year, we were able to incorporate two major park amenities – trails and playgrounds. The USGS National Digital Trails Dataset was used in conjunction with Open Street Map trails to show where people might be able to find trails inside parks in their community. This detail is provided to all cities and towns in the ParkServe database to help create a more holistic view of park systems in the US. 

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