Huntridge Circle Park, a three-acre stretch near the Maryland Parkway corridor with a playground and outdoor amphitheater, has sat closed to the public and fenced off since 2018. Now a group of neighbors wants to change that, floating everything from a dog park to a farmer's market as they push the city to finally bring the space back to life.
The push comes from Friends of Huntridge Park, which is proposing what it calls a public-private partnership with the city of Las Vegas. As reported by FOX5 Vegas, the group wants to “create a public-private partnership with the city of Las Vegas so that we can take over the operations, maintenance, and the programming for the park.” It's a notable ask for a park that has spent nearly two decades cycling through closures.
City officials had periodically shuttered and reopened Huntridge Circle Park beginning in 2006 to address homeless encampments, according to the station's report, before shutting it down indefinitely in 2018. A city spokesperson told 8 News Now that the park was originally closed due to safety concerns and requests from surrounding neighbors to close it. Per neighbors, campers who set up in the park brought drugs and violence and caused problems in nearby communities, and police said a known camper broke into an elderly woman's home and beat and robbed her in 2018.
A Neighborhood Divided Over What Comes Next
City officials and neighbors remain split over reopening Huntridge Circle Park, and the two sides have held numerous public meetings trying to work through it, the station's report notes. One idea that has come up in those discussions is a proposed sculpture garden for the space, though nothing has been settled. The city, for its part, occasionally opens the park for small community events even while the broader closure remains in place.
Freddy Godinez, a member of Friends of Huntridge Park with a background in architecture and public planning, argues that the fix isn't complicated: give the park a defined identity. “A set purpose for the space, set hours and set staff would help control safety issues in the area,” Godinez said, according to the same account. He also wants the park reimagined for safety and access from the Maryland Parkway corridor.
Godinez was careful to note that any solution has to include the people currently living without housing nearby. He said unhoused people are part of the community and need access to public spaces — a position that complicates any simple “reopen it and clear it out” framing of the debate.
UNLV Students Sketch Ideas, Neighbors Weigh In
Friends of Huntridge Park invited neighbors to meet with UNLV Landscape Architecture students about a possible redesign, and the students received feedback directly from residents at that gathering. Godinez invited the UNLV students to propose ways to reinvent the park, and city officials were present to listen as well. Out of those conversations came a wish list: residents proposed a dog park, a live theater space, a plaza and art fairs as possible uses for the site.
Randy Mendre, a Huntridge Circle Park-area resident, cautioned that none of it is set in stone yet. He said the project is conceptual and that the community should be involved, adding that residents deserve input into the entire project as it moves forward — not just a say after decisions are already made.
A Farmer's Market as an Early Test Run
The clearest near-term sign of movement is a farmer's market planned for October 24 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Huntridge Circle Park, organized by community members. It's a modest step compared to the sweeping redesign ideas circulating, but it gives neighbors a concrete date to point to after years of talk.
Any bigger plans still have to clear a formal hurdle. City officials have said that plans or upgrades for Huntridge Circle Park require Las Vegas City Council approval, meaning the dog parks, theaters and plazas floated by residents remain proposals rather than commitments. Built in 1941, according to 8 News Now, the park has a long history in the neighborhood — and its next chapter now depends on whether the city and its neighbors can find common ground.
