The Side of Memorial Park Closest to Tanglewood Is the One Under Construction

West Memorial Loop Drive runs beside a narrow strip of ground between the road and the Union Pacific rail line. Memorial Park Conservancy picked this strip for its next major project because it holds more archaeological remains of Camp Logan than anywhere else in the park. Camp Logan was the World War I training camp the park was built on, and 70,000 soldiers trained there. Construction on Memorial Groves began this spring. The Conservancy has scheduled completion for late 2027.

Coming from Tanglewood, the park starts at its west edge. That edge is where the Groves work is going on, where part of the main running loop is being moved, and where a planned bridge over Loop 610 is meant to come down. This fall the near side of Memorial Park is under construction, and most of the October calendar is happening on the far side.

What Memorial Groves Is Putting Along the West Loop

The project costs $50.5 million. Lead gifts came from Kinder Foundation at $10 million, plus $7.5 million each from John L. Nau III, the Brown Foundation and the Jerold B. Katz Foundation. Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects, who also wrote the park's master plan, are the designers.

At the center of the design is a planting of nearly 3,000 bald cypress trees set out in a strict grid, meant to read as soldiers standing in formation. The grove will cover twenty continuous acres along both sides of West Memorial Loop Drive. Open lawns will break up the rows at intervals that mark where Camp Logan's streets once ran. At the north end, a new visitor center designed by Moody Nolan will tell the camp's story and house the Conservancy's offices. The south end gets a picnic pavilion, a lawn and a playground. Both ends will have new parking and restrooms.

The playground is built around Camp Logan themes. Earthscape, a custom playground company, detailed the play features, which include oversized soldiers' helmets, army crates and a huge loaf of "hard bread" for children to climb on, plus a large bugle that doubles as a talk tube. The Texas Historical Commission will add new Camp Logan historic markers at selected entry points.

Groves is the first new Ten-Year Plan project since the Running Complex opened in November 2023. Before that came the Kinder Land Bridge and Cyvia and Melvyn Wolff Prairie in February 2023 and the Clay Family Eastern Glades in July 2020. Most of that earlier work sits toward the middle and east of the park. Groves puts the plan's next big project along the west loop road.

A Three-Mile Loop, Partway Through a Rebuild

The construction you will notice on a weekday run is on the Seymour Lieberman Trail. About 0.7 mile of it, or 3,600 feet, is being moved farther from West Memorial Loop Drive so the cypress can be planted between the trail and the road. On a loop of roughly three miles, that is close to a quarter of the route. When the work is finished, the Conservancy expects a shadier stretch, with the historic street lawns reaching across the road and new fitness stations along the way.

The Conservancy announced the trail work on April 17, 2026, and listed what stays the same and what changes during construction:

• The Seymour Lieberman Trail stays open the whole time and keeps its full loop of about three miles.
• Water fountains stay available. If one has to be shut off, the Conservancy says the downtime will be as short as possible.
• Free parking along West Memorial Loop Drive stays available.
• Some benches and some of the existing fitness stations are off-limits until the project is finished.

Some routes are a bigger change. The western part of the Outer Loop Trail is closed until 2027 for Groves construction. If you usually make a longer circuit on the west side, you will need to reroute until the Groves work is done.

October Takes Place on the Far Side

While the west edge is being rebuilt, this month's events are mostly near the Clay Family Eastern Glades, the Running Complex and the Picnic Loop. Several of them come with parking and access changes worth checking before you leave.

The Corporate 5K is the biggest of these. Organizers expect more than 10,000 participants from more than 250 companies on the race's tenth running. For that week, the Conservancy suggests the south-side natural surface trails and the Picnic Loop as quieter options.

Since June, the Eastern Glades have also had food trucks. A rotating set of vendors parks at Live Oak Court on select weekdays and weekends, including El Deleite, Casita Coffee Co. and Joyful Drink Experience.

One October event is close to the Tanglewood side. ArBOOretum at the Houston Arboretum & Nature Center runs October 17 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. There is no public parking on site that day. Shuttles carry visitors in, and ADA parking and rideshare drop-off go through 4501 Woodway Drive. On other days, Arboretum parking is free on Thursdays and $6.50 the rest of the week. Through March 14, 2027, it is also free on the second Sunday of each month.

The Bridge Is Planned for the Tanglewood End

The Groves work changes the west edge of the park. A second project would change how you get there from Tanglewood. On June 17, 2026, Houston City Council unanimously approved a development agreement with the Uptown Development Authority and TIRZ 16 to design and build the West Loop Shared Use Pathway and Bridge Project, a route for walkers and cyclists across Loop 610. Houston Public Media reported a cost of about $22.5 million, paid for with Federal Transit Administration and HUD grants. The ordinance requires no city money. A project rendering places the crossing near Buffalo Bayou, between Post Oak Boulevard and Woodway Drive.

Uptown's design brief for the architects describes the route in sections:

1. A 10-foot shared path along Post Oak Boulevard, then a lighted path beside I-610 to Buffalo Bayou.
2. A lighted 14-foot path on a bridge across the bayou, connecting the south bank to Memorial Park's Old Archery Range.
3. A path under I-610 to the Houston Arboretum and Nature Center, then a 10-foot trail along the Arboretum to Woodway Drive.
4. Crossings at Woodway, Memorial Drive and the Bayou Club and Houston Polo Grounds driveway, ending at the existing shared path along North Post Oak Road.

The brief describes a schematic that the chosen design team was to keep developing, so the final alignment could change. The endpoint matters for cyclists. The route ends at North Post Oak Road, not at the Seymour Lieberman Trail, and the Conservancy's current rules keep that trail open to pedestrians only.

There is no opening date. The ordinance gave no completion timeline. A funding step was on the table last week. The September 23, 2026 agenda for Harris County Improvement District #1 listed for consideration a resolution authorizing an Advance Funding Agreement with TxDOT for the Uptown Memorial Park Trail and Bridge Project, which also covers Buffalo Bayou flood remediation on TxDOT right-of-way. Earlier estimates called for construction in 2025 and later for a spring 2026 start. Both have passed, and no one has published a new date.

Getting In Until Then

For now, getting into the park on foot or by bike from Tanglewood means using the street. The Houston Parks Board's cycling route heads east from Tanglewood under 610, then follows Woodway past the Arboretum, where Woodway becomes Memorial Drive. Farther east, past Shepherd, it joins the Buffalo Bayou Trail. Uptown's design brief also lists the existing Woodway Drive shared path as one of the connections the new route would use.

Free parking along West Memorial Loop Drive stays available throughout construction, with direct access to the Seymour Lieberman Trail. Lots at the Running Complex and Picnic Loop close at 9 p.m. and reopen at 4:30 a.m. Their gates let cars out after closing, so a car left late can still leave.

Two dates are worth noting for the Woodway end of the park. Memorial Groves is scheduled to finish in late 2027, and the western Outer Loop Trail stays closed until 2027. The bridge's next published milestone is the TxDOT funding agreement that went before the improvement district on September 23.

The west edge of Memorial Park is the part of the park closest to Tanglewood, and the Groves work and the bridge plan will both change it over the next couple of years. If you are thinking about how that affects a Tanglewood home you plan to keep or sell, William Wheless can take you through it street by street. Let's Start a Conversation.