Clean-up costs estimated to be around $16,000.

A popular park in downtown Denver is open once again almost two months after being declared a public health hazard.

Lincoln Memorial Park, also known as Liberty Park or Veterans Park, located between the City and County Building and the Capitol Building, was shut down in mid-January to address a wide range of significant environmental and public health concerns, aka a giant rat infestation and other pretty gross waste issues. In addition to general-public waste, the park had become a site of a temporary tent city, which compounded the issues. The camp popped up for two weeks following a Denver County judge's ruling that the city’s camping ban was unconstitutional.

"Human and animal waste, drug paraphernalia, food waste … it’s making the conditions unsafe. We’ll reopen the park when it’s safe for people to be here again,” said Ann Cecchine-Williams, Deputy Executive Director of the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment during the initial closure.

Clean-up efforts were significant, including removing the tent city from the premises; about 40 tents were dismantled and removed. In addition, the project required 19 treatments for rat infestation, and two trees were removed from the park due to damage caused by the rats. Sidewalks and other surfaces in the park were pressure washed to help eliminate waste and bacteria. 

In total, it cost just over $16,200 to reopen the park, according to the Colorado Department of Personnel & Administration, which funded the project. Removing the two rat-damaged trees was the biggest expense at $7,500, followed by approximately $5,000 to exterminate the rats. 

In order to keep the park in working order, an 11 p.m.-5 a.m. curfew will be enforced by the Denver Police Department. This is in an effort to deter all camping activities in the park and the surrounding sidewalks, etc.

What do you think? Will you spend time in Lincoln Memorial Park now that it's no longer a public health hazard? Let us know in the comments.