The park is the second largest park in Los Angeles at 600 acres (2.4 km²). It is also the city's oldest park, founded in 1886 by the Elysian Park Enabling Ordinance. It hosted the shooting and the shooting part of the modern pentathlon events for the 1932 Summer Olympics. In 1964 the Citizens Committee to Save Elysian Park was founded to prevent the City of Los Angeles from constructing the Municipal Convention Center on 62 acres (250,000 m2) of park land. In 1967, it hosted a hippie "Love-In". Parkside residents enjoy the large and fruitful avocado trees that grow in the park.
The Figueroa Street Tunnels take northbound State Route 110 (the Pasadena Freeway) through the park.
According to the Mapping L.A. project of the Los Angeles Times, the Elysian Park neighborhood is flanked on the north and northeast by Elysian Valley, on the east by Lincoln Heights, on the southeast and south by Chinatown and on the southwest, west and northwest by Echo Park. Street and other boundaries are: the northern apex at Exit 138 of the Golden State Freeway, thence southeasterly along the freeway, southerly along the Los Angeles River, westerly along North Broadway, northwesterly along Stadium Way, Academy Road and northerly along Elysian Park Drive.
