Waterplace Park and Riverwalk

Waterplace Park and Riverwalk Review

Romantic Venetian-style footbridges, cobblestone walkways, and an amphitheater encircling a tidal pond set the tone at this 4-acre tract. The Riverwalk passes the junction of three rivers—the Woonasquatucket, Providence, and Moshassuck—a nexus of the shipping trade during the city's early years but an area that had been covered over with highways and parking lots by the middle of the 20th century. The focus of an urban-renewal project that uncovered the buried rivers, rerouted them, and surrounded them with amenities for pedestrians rather than cars, Waterplace Park is now a gathering place for the city. It's also the site of the popular Waterfire, a multimedia installation featuring music and nearly 100 burning braziers that rise from the water and are tended from boats; the dusk-to-midnight Waterfire happens approximately 16 times a year and attracts more than 500,000 visitors annually. The Rosa Parks Amphitheater is the site of free concerts in summer.