It's been nearly two years since the Warriors Community Foundation, the Kevin Durant Foundation and other funding partners refurbished our indoor and outdoor basketball courts and celebrated with the community. Looking back, it was a fun-filled day to remember, full of excitement, kids, and basketballs. Today the park is as busy as ever with a never-ending games of pick-up outside, and back to back activities of all sorts inside. 

On May 17th, 2017 Kevin Durant, along with the Warriors Community Foundation and their funding partners came to the park to dedicate the new basketball courts. It was a full day of inspiration, celebration and basketball! 

Since then, our new courts have been put to good use. The court hoops and surface are so much better than before.  Our new improvements has meant even more folks from across the city come to play basketball.  It's not unusual for all the outdoor courts to all be filled with players well into the night. Meanwhile, the indoor court continues to be used for a multitude of activities by people of all ages.  We are so grateful for our new courts and the opportunities it's provided for the community to connect. 

For over two and a half years, Friends of Lincoln Square Park has been tirelessly working to support the park's facilities, staff, and community. While we've been involved in multiple projects at the park, we remain focused on building an expanded and improved recreation center. Anyone who spends time at the Lincoln Recreation Center can see that it barely fits existing programs, much less accommodate the very visible development growth all around the park. 

To address this urgent community need, we've started co-hosting Lincoln Summer Nights, formed Friends of Lincoln Square Park, and shared our vision for a larger and improved recreation center. We've formed an incredibly dedicated steering committee and completed conceptual designs for a new recreation center. In case you're just hearing about us for the first time, here's a brief recap on our progress to date. 

Lincoln Square Park is the city’s busiest recreation center and park, with over 1,500 unique visitors each day, all day long. It is the only public recreation center in Downtown and serves residents of all ages, incomes and races from across the city and beyond. The adjacent bus stop at Harrison and 11th is one of the busiest in the system and provides much needed indoor and outdoor play areas for neighboring schools.  ​

Friends of Lincoln Square Park (FLSP) is a coalition of community leaders and volunteers including representatives from the Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation, the Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, local churches, family associations, the Wa Sung Community Service Club and other community organizations. We are working with the recreation center staff and the City to advocate, plan and fund the design and construction of an expanded and modernized recreation center that will be the center of Chinatown.  

The Lincoln Square Park Recreation Center (LSPRC) is 40 years old and in dire need of expansion and improvement. The current building is over capacity, as activities fill every room at nearly all hours. Pressure for more space is mounting as new residents move into the 5,000+ new apartments in Downtown leasing over the next year. A recent architectural analysis concluded that the facility floor area needs to be doubled just to meet existing demand.  

Our shared vision is a new three story recreation center with an indoor basketball gym, multipurpose and class rooms, space that can be indoor/outdoor, and a relocated Chinatown Hall of Pioneers as a central gathering space. This new building will have the space to host multiple simultaneous activities that bring together different generations and longtime and new Oaklanders.

We'd like to especially thank our main coordinators for Lincoln Summer Nights: Alvina Wong, Joshua Lee, Ying Cai, Jing Jing He, Donna Khorsheed, Sean Chow, Gilbert Gong and Tommy Wong.  Without their dedication to our community and Lincoln Square Park, none of this could have happened.  Thank you also to all the park staff, partners, funders, volunteers involved in hosting and funding Lincoln Summer Nights 2018, and especially to Karen Dea and the Wa Sung Community Services Club who worked with the City of Oakland to complete the much needed repairs of the Junk boat playground.

In the fall of 2018, the City of Oakland invited the community to submit proposals to inform their Capital Improvements Program. Our Steering Committee jumped at the chance to highlight the need and articulate our vision for the future of our recreation center. Here is our submission. This vision is not final, but the beginning of a community engagement and planning process over the coming months and years.

The Urgent Need: The Lincoln Square Park Recreation Center (LSPRC) is 40 years old and in dire need of expansion and improvement. The current building is over capacity, as activities fill every room at nearly all hours. The restrooms are inadequate in number and deferred maintenance. Pressure for more space is mounting as new residents move into the 5,000+ new apartments in Downtown leasing over the next year. A recent architectural analysis concluded that the facility floor area needs to be doubled just to meet existing demand.  

Friends of Lincoln Square Park (FOLSP) is a coalition of community leaders and volunteers including the Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation, the Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, local churches, family associations, the Wa Sung Community Service Club and other community organizations. We are working with the rec center staff and the City to advocate, plan and fund the design and construction of an expanded and modernized rec center that will be the center of Chinatown.  The FOLSP vision is a new three story rec center with an indoor basketball gym, multipurpose and class rooms, space that can be indoor/outdoor, and a relocated Chinatown Hall of Pioneers as a central foyer/gathering/performance/gallery space. This new building will have the space to host multiple simultaneous activities that bring together different generations and longtime and new Oaklanders.

Why Lincoln Square Park and Recreation Center: LSPRC is the city’s busiest rec center and park, with over 1,500 unique visitors each day, all day long. It is the only public recreation center in Downtown and serves residents of all ages, incomes and races from across the city and beyond. The adjacent bus stop at Harrison and 11th is one of the busiest in the system.  ​