Borski Park
Restored ecology and sweeping views at Philadelphia’s newest riverfront park.
Location: Philadelphia, PA
Client: Riverfront North, Philadelphia Parks and Recreation
Size: 10 acres
Project status: Phase 1 completed 2025. Future phases to be completed.
Project team: Ground Reconsidered; Langan (Project Prime), Sitio Architecture + Urbanism, O’Donnell & Naccarato, Arora Engineers
Located along Philadelphia’s Delaware River, this post-industrial brownfield will be transformed into a unique 10-acre waterfront park with links to the Delaware River and Circuit Trails and to the East Coast Greenway network. GR's involvement with this 10-acre brownfield site dates to our 2017 work on the Riverfront North Park Study. That study envisioned a restored and reinvigorated riverfront park which supports community gathering, ecological health, and passive recreation with native species, walking trails, a stage and restroom facilities, and a central lawn.
From the parking lot and trail head, visitors cross three bridges spanning a lush tiered rain garden, into the ‘lower park’ which includes a grand lawn, stage, amphitheater, public restrooms, covered picnic pavilion and a custom boardwalk extending over the riverbank focusing views to the Betsy Ross Bridge. The entire park has been regraded to provide universal access, while limiting cut/fill and avoiding disturbance of the contaminated soil. Imported soil will be installed over the existing pavement in the ‘lower park’. Diverse plant communities are planned including a gravel garden, woodland restoration and creation, and riparian buffer in the ‘lower park’. The ‘upper park’ is ringed with a woodland with a large central meadow and path network. Riverfront North Partnership and Philadelphia Parks & Recreation have worked to eliminate invasive plants on site and the proposed plant palette will be composed entirely of native species.
