Fremont Listed Among Worst Cities for Recreation

Three California cities listed among worst cities for recreation

Fremont, a city in California’s San Francisco Bay Area with roughly 236,000 people, cannot seem to catch a break. In June, it was listed among the worst cities for staycations. Now in July, the city finds itself among the worst cities for recreation.

How it got on this list is a bit perplexing. The city of Fremont has been a Tree City USA since 1996. There are approximately 55,000 trees in city parks, streets, and landscaped boulevard areas. The city operates the Olive Hyde Art Gallery, adjacent to Mission San Jose, which has featured Bay Area artists such as Wendy Yoshimura, the California Society of Printmakers and the Etsy collective. The public gallery is housed in a former home of Olive Hyde, a descendant of early San Francisco Mayor George Hyde.

Fremont Central Park has 450-acres on Paseo Padre Parkway between Grimmer Road and Stevenson Boulevard, easily accessible from I-880 and I-680. It was developed in 1960, and contains Lake Elizabeth an 83-acre (340,000 m2) man-made lake. The lake was dedicated in 1969 to Fremont’s former sister city: Elizabeth, South Australia. The Fremont Park Golf Course is northeast of the park, and the Aqua Adventure water park and group picnic areas is southwest of the park.

Do not blame us for the ranking, Thank WalletHub,

With July being National Parks and Recreation Month and 7 out of 10 Americans now leaving their homes on an average day thanks to the COVID-19 vaccine, the personal-finance website WalletHub released its report on 2021’s Best & Worst Cities for Recreation.

To highlight the benefits of recreational activities for consumers and economies across the country, WalletHub compared the 100 largest U.S. cities across 48 key indicators of recreation-friendliness. For each city, it examined the accessibility of entertainment and recreational facilities, the quality of parks and the weather.

Best Cities for Recreation
1. Orlando, FL
2. Las Vegas, NV
3. San Diego, CA
4. Cincinnati, OH
5. Tampa, FL
6. Honolulu, HI
7. Atlanta, GA
8. Albuquerque, NM
9. St. Louis, MO
10. New Orleans, LA

Worst Cities for Recreation

91. Fremont, CA
92. Hialeah, FL
93. Newark, NJ
94. Jersey City, NJ
95. Irving, TX
96. Fort Wayne, IN
97. Chula Vista, CA
98. Garland, TX
99. Durham, NC
100. Oakland, CA

Best vs. Worst

• San Francisco and Boston have the highest share of the population with walkable park access, 100 percent, which is 3.1 times higher than in Indianapolis, the city with the lowest at 32 percent.
• New York has the most playgrounds per square root of the population, 0.664460, which is 13.4 times more than in Hialeah, Florida, the city with the fewest at 0.049557.
• San Francisco has the highest spending on parks per capita, $350, which is 18.4 times higher than in Stockton, California, the city with the lowest at $19.
• San Francisco has the most bike rental facilities per square root of the population, 0.051315, which is 42.3 times more than in El Paso, Texas, the city with the fewest at 0.001213.

To view the full report and your city’s rank, click here.