Location: China Basin Way between Third Street and Terry Francois Boulevard Map
China Basin Park occupies a five-acre waterfront site just across from Oracle Park. Designed by SCAPE, the park will serve as a regional destination with a neighborhood park at its heart. Its design carves out space for a wide range of programs and connections to the surrounding area.
The park includes:
- Great Lawn – Framing expansive views of the water, ballpark, skyline, and Bay Bridge, a sculpted one-acre lawn provides flexibly programmed space for play and gathering. Gradually sloping down towards the water, it also creates a natural amphitheater for movie nights and other events. The lawn also uses innovative soils design and a climate-responsive irrigation system to carve out space that can accommodate both large events and support the health of the live oak and climate-adaptive island oak trees along its perimeter.
- Bay Trail – Connecting downtown San Francisco and South of Market to the revived southeastern waterfront, a key portion of the Bay Trail runs directly through China Basin Park – also connecting into a 350-mile network of trails and open spaces across the region. The trail is incorporated here as a key aspect of circulation around the park, offering walkers and cyclists unfettered views of the Bay Bridge, Berkeley Hills, Yerba Buena Island, Oracle Park, and downtown San Francisco. Elevated ~five feet above existing grade, the trail also functions as the primary ‘line of protection’ for Mission Rock from coastal flooding.
- Shoreline Sands – This sandy stretch is designed to bring visitors closer to the water. Abutted by the beloved Willie McCovey Statue, this area provides access to the waterfront and a place for gathering ,relaxation and recreation.
- Central Plaza – A generous plaza sits at the heart of China Basin Park – capturing the energy of the park and the surrounding community, gathering and condensing energy from the adjacent Mission Rock neighborhood, Mission Bay, and South of Market. The plaza’s orientation and scale have been crafted to perfectly frame McCovey Cove, the Bay Bridge, and the downtown skyline in a single view. On the north side of the plaza, dramatic stadium seats face the Willie McCovey statue and Oracle Park, reflecting the energy of the ballpark and cove on game days.
- Gathering Grove – Just west of the plaza, an elevated grove lit by catenary lights is an ideal area for cultural events, street vendors, music, art fairs, and other programs. Sheltered by climate-adaptive Arbutus marina trees, the grove will mitigate wind impacts along the entire western half of the park. In time, the grove will expand into a contiguous canopy shaped by the trees’ undulating sculptural forms.
- Stormwater Garden – Buffering the park’s edge along Pier 48, an 11,000-square-foot stormwater garden helps capture, store, and convey runoff from a large portion of Phase One and the Great Lawn – incorporating green infrastructure as a publicly-accessible feature through a series of elevated boardwalks crossing the garden. Boosting the park's overall biodiversity through water-tolerant native species, the garden provides a space for more intimate reflection and engagement with the park’s natural systems.
