Pontchartrain Beach

Located behind the University of New Orlean's Research and Technology Park in New Orleans, this is the site of the historic amusement park of the same name. The sandy beaches are currently closed to swimmers while the site undergoes renovations.

Pontchartrain Beach was an amusement park located in New Orleans, Louisiana, on the south shore of Lake Pontchartrain. It was founded in 1928, across Bayou St. John from an existing amusement resort at Old Spanish Fort. Pontchartrain Beach's original location is the present-day lakefront neighborhood of Lake Terrace.

In the early 1930s, due to the construction of a seawall extending from West End to the Industrial Canal which created a new shoreline for Lake Pontchartrain, Pontchartrain Beach was moved to a new location at the lake end of Elysian Fields Avenue, where it now remains. Water quality has increased in recent decades.

**A mile-long sand beach is still at the same area where Pontchartrain Beach once was. It is inaccessible and off limits to the general public, having been deemed hazardous due to underwater drop offs and riprap which pose dangers for swimmers.**

Get directions to this beach

Water Quality

Special health or safety status in effect
Special Status
This means the affiliate organization managing a beach has set the beach status based on special local knowledge or information. Check the beach description and the Sources section for details.

For water quality icon legend, click:

Report Pollution

Monitoring Frequency

Source Information

The Pontchartrain Conservancy (PC) monitors water quality at sites in the Lake Pontchartrain region. Sampling is conducted year-round, and samples are usually collected on Tuesdays and reported to Swimguide on Fridays. In the event of severe weather or holiday, samples may be collected on Wednesdays. Samples are not collected for the week of Christmas nor Mardi Gras.

Water samples are analyzed at all sites for Fecal coliform and Enterococcus. Water physiochemical parameters are also collected as field measurements. These include: Dissolved Oxygen (DO), water temperature, conductivity, and salinity (parts per thousand). Full weekly results can be viewed at: https://scienceforourcoast.org/pc-programs/waterquality/weekly-data-report/

A location will be marked Green when the average Enterococci in sample does not exceed 35 colonies/100 mL and no more than 10 percent of the individual samples collected shall exceed 130 enterococci colonies/100 mL; AND no more than 25 percent of the total samples collected exceed a fecal coliform density of 2,000/100 mL

A location will be marked Red when the average Enterococci in a sample exceeds 35 colonies/100 mL or 10 percent of the individual samples in the data set exceed 130 enterococci colonies/100 mL; AND if the location exceeds a fecal coliform density of 2,000/100 mL.

A location is marked Grey when there are no current results or there is no available information.

Water Quality Graph