The Visitor Center and accompanying Park Entry Plaza will be the gateway to the park and a standalone designation. The pavilions and buildings will accommodate staff and an educational visitor center. New indoor rooms, outdoor patios, and overlooks will highlight spectacular views to the north and the verdant landfill slopes to the south. As a destination, it will be a place to learn about the Park’s history, rules, and sustainability, to picnic, and to rest before journeying up the mountain.

From the entry at Crossroads Parkway, an accessible pedestrian/cyclist trail will lead up into the Entry Plaza garden. A shuttle/bus drop-off and parking area will also welcome the community. This will be a point of departure for trails and tours of the Materials Recovery Facility (MRF).

Activities associated with the MRF and sanitation trucks will be part of the Entry Plaza, highlighting the stimulating mix of passive open space, public recreation and industrial function. The separated Sanitation Districts/MRF truck area is required for off-loading functions of certain types of truck customers. Other MRF customers use the area for removing and replacing tarps on their trucks. These shared uses in the Park Entry Plaza will continue and are forecasted to increase as MRF traffic increases in the future. A relocated storage area, equal in square footage to the current storage area, will shift locations to maximize efficient shared use of the Entry Plaza space.