2023’s Cities With the Most Green Space (2024)

Exploring nature within your city is a great way to destress and get moving into the new year.

So, which cities have the best access to parks and yards?

Lawn Love ranked nearly 100 of the biggest U.S. cities to determine 2023’s Cities With the Most Green Space.

We compared the cities based on the number of parks, total acreage, and average yard size, among five total factors.

Check out the 10 greenest (and 10 grayest) cities below, followed by key insights from our report. (See where your city ranks.)

Key insights:

• Active along the Atlantic: It’s easy to hit the trails for some green exercise in Atlantic-adjacent cities — three of which landed among our top five greenest cities.

  Chesapeake, Virginia, brings home the gold with the highest total green area per capita out of the cities in our ranking. Jacksonville, Florida (No. 2), has the highest park acreage, followed by Chesapeake. These two cities — along with Virginia Beach, Virginia (No. 5) — boast high scores across the board, offering plenty of green space to soothe their urban residents.

• Soaking up the sun: Albuquerque, New Mexico (No. 9), has the third-highest share of land used for parks and recreation, with Scottsdale, Arizona (No. 4), and the Las Vegas metro following closely behind. Each of these regions has high total park acreage, offering plenty of parkland for hiking or picnicking.

  The Valley of the Sun is full of parks to stretch your legs and get some fresh air. Scottsdale is a major golfing destination — the city has more than 50 golf courses to play on and stroll through. Sprawling Phoenix (No. 13) has the third-largest total park acreage among all the cities we ranked.

• Escaping the concrete jungle: Jersey City (No. 95) and Newark, New Jersey (No. 97), scored low across the board, leaving residents with few options for a green getaway. These two Garden State cities are dense and highly populated, leaving little room for large green landscapes.

  Despite being the most quintessential concrete jungle, New York (No. 7) prioritizes green space for its residents. New York has the highest number of parks and green spaces to explore. NYC also has a large share of land used for parks and high total park acreage. In fact, an astounding 99% of residents in The Big Apple live within a 10-minute walk to a park.

Our full ranking and analysis are available here:https://lawnlove.com/blog/cities-with-most-green-space/