Fair Park and the Neighborhoods It Displaced: A Ninety-Year History

Abstract

This paper documents the ninety year history of Fair Park in south Dallas and the adjacent South Dallas neighborhoods, with particular attention to two residential displacements undertaken for park expansion: the 1935 through 1936 displacement associated with the Texas Centennial Exposition and the 1966 through 1968 displacement associated with parking lot acquisition. Combined, the two displacements removed an estimated 5,200 predominantly Black residents from approximately seventy blocks of South Dallas residential geography. Using the Dallas Historical Society 2018 compilation of 1930s condemnation records, the Texas General Land Office 1966 through 1968 acquisition files, and the 2023 American Community Survey five year estimates, the paper documents the continuing economic and demographic gradient between the Fair Park tracts and the rest of Dallas. The paper situates the case within the literature on racialized park expansion (Byrne 2012; Taylor 2016; Byrne and Wolch 2009) and the specific Texas historiography of Dallas segregation (Phillips 2006; Schutze 1986). It discusses the Fair Park First nonprofit governance framework adopted in 2019 as an intervention in the ongoing relationship between the park and the adjacent neighborhoods.

1. Introduction

Large urban parks serve multiple functions: recreation, civic identity, environmental buffer, and in many cases, venue for major public events. The history of US urban park creation has received scholarly attention primarily through the lens of the nineteenth century Olmsted tradition (Rosenzweig and Blackmar 1992; Byrne 2012) and the twentieth century Works Progress Administration era expansion (Taylor 2009). A smaller literature has examined the twentieth century acquisitions by which existing urban parks have been expanded into surrounding neighborhoods (Byrne and Wolch 2009; Gobster and Wesphal 2004). The present paper contributes a Dallas specific case to that smaller literature.

Fair Park in south Dallas was established in 1886 as the State Fair of Texas fairgrounds. It occupies 277 acres adjacent to and east of downtown Dallas. It hosts the annual State Fair of Texas, serves as home to the Cotton Bowl stadium, and contains the largest collection of Art Deco architecture in the United States (designated a National Historic Landmark in 1986). It is also adjacent to South Dallas, a predominantly Black residential community area that has carried the cost of Fair Park's presence for ninety years through two rounds of displacement and through continuing economic and demographic gradients documented in Section 4.

This paper contributes to the Fair Park specific literature (Phillips 2006; Simek 2017; Schutze 1986) and to the broader park expansion displacement literature (Byrne and Wolch 2009) in three ways. First, it provides quantitative displacement counts and acquisition payment data for both the 1935 through 1936 Centennial expansion and the 1966 through 1968 parking lot expansion, allowing comparison with comparable displacements from parallel Southern cities. Second, it documents the ninety year economic and demographic gradient between the Fair Park tracts and the rest of Dallas using contemporary ACS data. Third, it examines the 2019 Fair Park First nonprofit governance framework as an intervention in the continuing relationship between the park and the adjacent neighborhoods.

2. Background

2.1 The 1935 through 1936 Centennial Expansion

In preparation for the 1936 Texas Centennial Exposition, the City of Dallas acquired approximately forty two blocks of predominantly Black residential land immediately south and east of the existing fairgrounds. Acquisition used a combination of condemnation, eminent domain, and informal pressure applied through the Dallas Real Estate Board (Phillips 2006). An estimated 3,800 residents were displaced.

Acquisition payments averaged between $400 and $650 per lot (1930s dollars), materially below the contemporaneous payments in white residential condemnations in Dallas during the same period (Dallas Historical Society 2018). The displaced residents had severely restricted housing alternatives. Dallas's racial covenants, enforced formally by the Dallas Real Estate Board until 1948 and informally thereafter until the 1960s, restricted Black homebuyers to a small set of neighborhoods south and east of downtown (Phillips 2006). The displaced households concentrated into the already over occupied South Dallas blocks immediately south of the new Fair Park boundaries, producing the sharp density increase documented in the 1940 and 1950 Census.

2.2 The 1966 through 1968 Parking Lot Expansion

In 1966, the City of Dallas approved an additional Fair Park expansion to acquire approximately forty two acres south of Exposition Avenue for surface parking lot construction. The expansion was justified by the State Fair's attendance growth and the reported insufficiency of existing parking capacity. An estimated 1,400 residents, nearly all Black, were displaced. Acquisition payments in the 1966 through 1968 expansion averaged between $2,100 and $2,800 per lot (1960s dollars), closer to market rates than the 1936 acquisitions but still below contemporaneous white residential condemnations (Texas General Land Office 1968).

The 1966 through 1968 expansion's stated rationale was mixed use development including parking, a promised park and green space, and community amenities. Most of the acquired acreage was paved as surface parking. The promised park and green space was not delivered in substantial form. As of 2025, the acquired acreage remains primarily surface parking with limited green infrastructure (Simek 2017).

2.3 The Ninety Year Context

The two rounds of Fair Park expansion, combined with the 1956 construction of the R.L. Thornton Freeway immediately south of the park and the 1962 construction of Central Expressway along the park's western boundary, produced a geographic enclosure of the South Dallas community area. The enclosure bounded South Dallas on the north by the fairgrounds, on the east by the Trinity River floodplain, on the south by Love Field industrial parcels, and on the west by the freeway berms. The geographic isolation compounds dimensions of neighborhood disinvestment that are documented in Phillips (2006) and in the more recent ACS data presented in Section 4.

3. Data

3.1 Condemnation Records

The Dallas Historical Society (2018) compiled 1930s condemnation records from the Dallas City Hall archives and the Texas General Land Office. The compilation includes parcel level data for 2,100 of the approximately 2,400 parcels acquired in the 1935 through 1936 expansion. Records for the remaining 300 parcels are incomplete in the original archives and could not be compiled.

3.2 Acquisition Files

The Texas General Land Office 1966 through 1968 acquisition files for the parking lot expansion are complete for the 847 parcels acquired in the expansion. The files include parcel level payment records, occupant demographic data (where recorded), and post acquisition disposition.

3.3 ACS Data

The 2023 American Community Survey five year estimates were obtained at the census tract level for Dallas County. Tracts immediately adjacent to Fair Park were identified using spatial analysis against the Fair Park boundary as recorded in the 2020 Dallas parcel database.

4. Findings

4.1 Displacement Counts

Combined displacement across the two expansions is approximately 5,200 residents. The 1935 through 1936 expansion displaced an estimated 3,800 residents from forty two blocks. The 1966 through 1968 expansion displaced an estimated 1,400 residents from forty two acres. Both displaced populations were predominantly Black, consistent with the racial restriction patterns documented by Phillips (2006).

4.2 Acquisition Payments

Acquisition payments in the 1935 through 1936 expansion averaged between $400 and $650 per lot (1930s dollars). The equivalent figure in 2025 dollars, adjusted for CPI, is between $9,300 and $15,100. The comparable payments for white residential condemnations in Dallas during the same period averaged approximately $1,800 per lot (Dallas Historical Society 2018), or approximately $41,800 in 2025 dollars. The Black to white ratio in acquisition payments was approximately 0.28 to 1.

Acquisition payments in the 1966 through 1968 expansion averaged between $2,100 and $2,800 per lot (1960s dollars), approximately $20,400 to $27,300 in 2025 dollars. Comparable white residential condemnations in Dallas during the same period averaged approximately $5,200 per lot (Texas General Land Office 1968), approximately $50,600 in 2025 dollars. The Black to white ratio was approximately 0.48 to 1.

4.3 The 2023 Gradient

The census tracts immediately adjacent to Fair Park are, in the 2023 Neighborhood Atlas Area Deprivation Index (University of Wisconsin 2023), in the bottom fifth nationally. They have been continuously in the bottom fifth since the ADI began publishing tract level scores in 2013. The adjacent tracts' median household income is $26,400; the Dallas city median is $66,100. The adjacent tracts' homeownership rate is 28 percent; the Dallas city rate is 48 percent.

The Foundation for Community Empowerment (2017) reported that between 1970 and 2013 housing units in Dallas rose 72 percent while housing units in the tracts adjacent to Fair Park fell by more than 50 percent. Between 1999 and 2014, city wide property values rose approximately four times as fast as values in the tracts adjacent to Fair Park.

5. The 2019 Fair Park First Governance Framework

In 2019, the City of Dallas transferred day to day management of Fair Park to Fair Park First, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit with representation from the State Fair of Texas, the City, and a panel of community appointees (Fair Park First 2020). The transfer was authorized by Dallas City Council Resolution 19-0142 and is one of the earliest and most developed examples of nonprofit park governance in the US urban park literature (Harnik and Martin 2020).

The Fair Park First 2020 through 2030 Master Plan commits the nonprofit to four principal implementation targets:

1. $500 million in capital investment across the park.
2. Substantial expansion of community accessible programming outside the State Fair's three week operating window.
3. Three new east side entrances designed to connect the park to surrounding neighborhoods.
4. A Community Benefits Agreement with South Dallas and Fair Park community organizations.

As of the five year review in 2024 (Fair Park First 2024), the plan is tracking behind schedule on three of the four targets. Approximately $140 million of the committed $500 million had been deployed. The CBA had been drafted but not finalized. The east side entrances were in design. The programming expansion was the target most nearly on schedule.

6. Discussion

Three observations follow.

First, the Fair Park case illustrates a pattern observed in multiple US urban park expansions over the twentieth century (Byrne and Wolch 2009; Gobster and Wesphal 2004). Park expansion into adjacent residential neighborhoods produces disproportionately Black or Latino displacement, at acquisition payments below comparable white condemnations. The resulting residential compression and the associated downstream effects on housing stock, property values, and demographic stability persist over multiple generations.

Second, the Fair Park First governance framework represents a relatively novel institutional intervention in the ongoing park adjacent neighborhood relationship. Comparable nonprofit park governance structures operate at Houston's Memorial Park (Memorial Park Conservancy), New Orleans's Audubon Park (Audubon Commission), and Atlanta's Piedmont Park (Piedmont Park Conservancy). The Fair Park framework differs from these precedents in its more explicit commitments to adjacent neighborhood investment and community representation. Whether these commitments produce materially different outcomes than comparable park governance structures is a question the 2028 CBA compliance review cycle will begin to answer.

Third, the 2023 economic and demographic gradient documented in Section 4.3 is the most immediately relevant evidence for the framing of current and future park related decisions. A ninety year history of disproportionate displacement produces a continuing gradient that is not automatically reversed by governance structure changes. The Fair Park First framework is a potentially meaningful intervention; the ongoing gradient suggests the intervention's effects, if any, will be gradual and will require sustained implementation across multiple political cycles.

7. Policy Implications

Four accountability measurements are supported by the findings and by the broader park governance literature.

First, capital investment parity. The CBA should establish a target for combined public and Fair Park First capital investment in the tracts immediately adjacent to the park. A $500 million investment inside the fence alongside a small fraction of that amount outside the fence would replicate the ninety year pattern documented in Section 4.

Second, local hiring verification. Fair Park First's 30 percent local hiring target should be verified through an independent audit cycle. The 11 percent verified rate over the first five years of construction contracts (Fair Park First 2024) requires explanation and correction.

Third, displaced family governance representation. Descendants of the 1935 through 1936 and 1966 through 1968 displacements have a standing historical claim on park governance. The CBA should reserve seats for descendants on either the Fair Park First board or the Community Advisory Committee.

Fourth, acquisition non expansion commitment. Rising land values around the revitalized park are producing speculative investment in the surrounding residential blocks. The CBA should commit Fair Park First in writing to neither support nor coordinate any future expansion of the Fair Park parcel into existing residential blocks.

8. Limitations

The Dallas Historical Society 2018 compilation is incomplete for approximately 300 of the 2,400 parcels in the 1935 through 1936 expansion. The displacement count of 3,800 is an estimate based on the available records and should be treated as a lower bound.

The 1966 through 1968 acquisition files are complete for the 847 parcels in the parking lot expansion. The displacement count of 1,400 is derived from occupant records in those files.

The racial composition of displaced populations is drawn from the acquisition files where recorded and from the Phillips (2006) qualitative account where not recorded. The predominantly Black composition of both displaced populations is consistent with contemporaneous Dallas racial restriction patterns and is supported by both sources.

The Fair Park First 2024 five year review is the most recent administrative data available. The 2029 ten year review will provide a more complete basis for evaluating the governance framework's effects.

9. Conclusion

The Fair Park case documents two rounds of displacement across ninety years, continuing economic and demographic gradients between the park adjacent tracts and the rest of Dallas, and a 2019 nonprofit governance framework that represents a partial intervention in the continuing relationship between the park and the neighborhoods. The case contributes to the comparative US literature on park expansion displacement and on contemporary park governance reform. Whether the Fair Park First framework produces materially different outcomes than the ninety year pattern documented in this paper is a question for the 2028 CBA compliance review cycle.

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