Golden Gate Park Nominated for USA TODAY Best City Park Award, Voting Open Until April 6

Golden Gate Park has been nominated for the USA TODAY 10Best Readers' Choice Best City Park award, with voting open through Monday, April 6 at 8:59 a.m. The San Francisco Recreation & Parks Department, which has overseen the park since 1871, announced the nomination and is calling on residents to cast their votes before the deadline.

The 1,017-acre park stretches 3.5 miles from the center of the city to the Pacific Ocean and draws more than 24 million visitors each year. It earned National Historic Landmark and California Historic Resource designations in 2004, recognized under Criterion C in the area of landscape architecture as a pioneering example of a large 19th-century urban park in the United States. The California Office of Historic Preservation notes the park's design was influenced by Frederick Law Olmsted Sr. and that its period of significance spans 1871 to 1943, with 135 contributing resources still present.

Within those miles of wooded trails sit the de Young Museum, the California Academy of Sciences, and the Japanese Tea Garden, alongside tennis courts, disc golf courses, a boating lake, and athletic fields near Ocean Beach. The park also maintains what USA TODAY 10Best describes as possibly "the only park in the country with a bison paddock."

The National AIDS Memorial Grove, seven acres of the park federally recognized by Congress and President Bill Clinton as the first AIDS memorial in the United States, earned the Rudy Bruner Silver Medal Award for excellence in the urban environment in 1999. The grove remains one of the park's most significant cultural landmarks.

Golden Gate Park also anchors San Francisco's live music calendar. It hosts Outside Lands and Hardly Strictly Bluegrass each year, with Outside Lands having featured headliners including Radiohead, Paul McCartney, Kendrick Lamar, Elton John, The Weeknd, Billie Eilish, Tyler, the Creator, and SZA. The San Francisco Chronicle has credited Outside Lands with "transforming Golden Gate Park into a world class music venue."

This is not the park's first appearance in the 10Best rankings. It finished as runner-up for Best City Park in both 2015 and 2024, and placed second in 2023. Votes can be cast on the USA TODAY 10Best website before the April 6 deadline.