Easter Lake Park

Easter Lake is a reservoir located in southeast Des Moines, Iowa, completed in 1967 for recreation. The park has a lake and a trail around it. It has a watershed and is owned and operated by Polk County Conservation.

History

Before Easter Lake was created, it was a strip mine used to mine coal, which closed in 1959. In 1959 the strip coal mine was closed. In 1967, Easter Lake was officially opened.
In 2000, Easter Lake was visited by about 400,000 people, making it one of the busiest parks in Polk County. The lake was included on a registry of seriously polluted Iowan waterways in 2008. On August 27, 2025, the Polk County Conservation found that the levels of E. coli in the lake made it unsafe to swim in.