Bde Maka Ska

At 421 acres and a maximum depth of 89.9 feet, this is the largest and deepest lake inside the city limits, draining a watershed of 2,992 acres. The Minneapolis Park Board voted unanimously to change the name from Lake Calhoun in January 2018, and the change was approved at the federal level that June; the Dakota name reaches back to Ḣeyate Otuŋwe, the agricultural community founded on its banks in 1829 by Maḣpiya Wic̣aṡṭa. Park board records from the 1930s show bath houses here and at Nokomis going out of service when lake levels dropped, which is how far back the swimming infrastructure runs.

Water body type

lake

Formerly known as

Lake Calhoun

Category: Beaches & Water

Tags: chain of lakes, deepest, renamed, swimming

Coordinates: 44.9421117, -93.311993

Part of Minneapolis's lakes, the ones the park board looks after

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