Halperin Park at the Dallas Parks and Recreation page had been listed as "Coming Soon" for years before the gates finally opened on May 8, 2026. The five-acre deck spans I-35E between Ewing and Marsalis Avenues, directly adjacent to the Dallas Zoo, and is owned by the City of Dallas. Day-to-day operations are handled by the private Southern Gateway Public Green Foundation, the same organizational model that manages Klyde Warren Park in Uptown.

April Allen, CEO of Southern Gateway Public Green Foundation, described Halperin Park as offering "a world-class" space for a part of Dallas long defined by infrastructure rather than green space. That framing is accurate. I-35E has been a dividing line through Oak Cliff's residential neighborhoods for more than half a century. The park does not erase that history, but it does give the communities on both sides of it something to share.

What the Park Offers

The design includes water features, a playground, a band shell for outdoor performances, and a flexible community building intended to host events, programs, and neighborhood gatherings. The mix is intentional. A deck park that serves only as passive green space is useful. One that also has infrastructure for programming, performances, and community events becomes a neighborhood anchor.

The naming itself reflects a significant philanthropic commitment. The $23 million Halperin Foundation gift is the largest private donation in the project's history and secured the park's name. The full project investment of $300 million drew from public and private sources over a long development timeline, a combination of city capital funds, philanthropic gifts, and federal infrastructure dollars.

Klyde Warren Park, which opened in 2012 over Woodall Rodgers Freeway in the Arts District corridor, demonstrated what this model can accomplish in terms of activation and real estate ripple effects. But Klyde Warren serves a different neighborhood context: it opened in an area already surrounded by dense commercial and cultural amenities. Halperin Park is opening in South Dallas, where the surrounding neighborhoods have had far fewer green spaces per resident and where infrastructure investment has historically moved more slowly.

A Green Space Gap Gets Filled

The park's location adjacent to the Dallas Zoo adds a practical dimension. The zoo draws visitors from across the metropolitan area, and Halperin Park creates a natural extension of that destination. Families who come for the zoo now have a free public green space next door. For Oak Cliff residents, the park is a neighborhood amenity that does not require a car trip to reach.

The Southern Gateway Public Green Foundation's private management model gives the park operational flexibility that city-run parks sometimes lack. Programming, events, maintenance, and activation decisions can move faster through a nonprofit foundation structure than through the city's parks department procurement and scheduling processes. That matters for a park designed to be a genuine community gathering place rather than a passive green space.

Green spaces and neighborhood character are deeply linked in ways that do not always make the budget spreadsheet. A park that draws residents outside, hosts a summer concert series, anchors a farmers market, and gives children a place to run changes the daily texture of a neighborhood. Halperin Park has the physical scale and the programming infrastructure to do all of that for Oak Cliff.

Visit the Halperin Park page on Dallas Parks and Recreation for current hours, upcoming programming, and directions to the park from both Ewing and Marsalis Avenue access points.