Market Street Park

A small city park at the northern edge of downtown Charlottesville, and the site that put the city in the international news. Known as Lee Park until 2017, it held an equestrian statue of Confederate general Robert E. Lee erected in 1924. The city council's decision to remove it triggered the Unite the Right rally in August 2017; the statue itself was not taken down until 2021 and was melted down in 2023.

What remains is a plain green square with mature trees, benches, and an empty plinth site — quiet, unremarkable to look at, and heavy with recent history. The Jefferson-Madison Regional Library sits directly across Market Street, with First United Methodist Church and Social Hall on the Jefferson Street side.