Forest Park is a major public anchor of the city

Forest Park is one of the country’s large urban parks and the home of several free public institutions in St. Louis, including the zoo, the art museum, the history museum, and the science center. It hosted the 1904 World’s Fair, which still shapes the park’s layout and some of its buildings. For residents it functions as shared public land managed by the City with a major nonprofit conservancy partner. The practical note is simply that a lot of the city’s free, family-scale culture is concentrated here, and the park is a useful orientation point for the central corridor.