City News Roundup

Marathon and holiday trains make this a festive roundup of Dallas news

DART Rail train soupled-up holiday-style.

DART

This roundup of news around Dallas includes info about a festive new program by DART, an appointment at a local radio station, the re-naming of a city park, and an update on the annual marathon which is this weekend.

Here's. what's happening in Dallas this week:

Marathon weekend
The annual marathon is this weekend, specifically on Sunday December 11 with races on Saturday leading up to the bigger event on Sunday. One thing hard to find on their website is the route, but Dallas Police Department tweeted a map showing the loop it'll make: downtown, Uptown, Greenville Avenue, White Rock Lake, and back to City Hall. It starts at 8:30 am, so basically: avoid that entire area all morning.

The marathon is held rain or shine, and there is definitely rain forecast for this weekend; in fact a couple of Xmasy events around DFW have been postponed, including Merry Market at CityLine in Richardson and Santa Days at the Plaza at Preston Center. But marathons are all about endurance, so this thing will go on through heavy rain, thunder, lightning, high winds, and temperature extremes.

Hi Hiawatha
The City of Dallas has renamed Cummings Recreation Center in Oak Cliff in honor of Hiawatha Williams, founder of the Dallas-based Williams Chicken restaurant chain. The park is at 2976 Cummings St., mere blocks from where the first Williams Chicken opened at Ledbetter and Sunnyvale streets 35 years ago. It'll now be called Hiawatha Williams Recreation Center.

HR at WRR
Kurt Rongey has been appointed Assistant Program Director of WRR 101.1 FM, the classical music station previously run by the city of Dallas, now under the management of KERA. Rongey previously worked at WRR for 17 years as Operations Manager for 10 years, and hosted the Going Home Show. Rongey will help lead the classical music station’s conversion to an all-classical, noncommercial format and transition the management from the city of Dallas to KERA.

Festive DART
Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) has debuted its first annual holiday train and buses. There's just a single Holiday Train, wrapped with snowmen and hundreds of twinkling holiday lights to create cheer. The holiday train will travel throughout the entire DART Service Area, making regularly scheduled stops at each station along the route each evening, as follows:

December 5-11: Orange Line
December 12-18: Red Line
December 19-25: Green Line
December 26-January 1: Blue Line

DART's Holiday buses will travel on various bus routes throughout the DART Service Area through the end of the year.

DART will also host two Holiday Station events featuring radio, live music, a visit from Santa Claus, and promotional giveaways, as follows:

Saturday, December 10, 12-2 pm, Cockrell Hill Transfer Location, 4430 West Jefferson Blvd.,
Tuesday, December 13, 12-4 pm, Akard Station, 1401 Pacific Ave.

Anyone looking to ride the DART Holiday Train and Bus can use DART's “Festive Vehicle” tracker on the DART Trip Planner at DART.org.

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Goals

Dallas scores New York Times honor as a top travel destination in 2026

joe daniel price/Getty Images

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The influential New York Times thinks tourists will get a kick out of Dallas in 2026. Big D ranks sixth on the Times’ new list of the 52 top travel destinations for 2026.

Why Dallas? The Times emphasizes DFW’s status as a host of nine FIFA World Cup matches this year — more matches than any other North American host. Furthermore, Arlington’s AT&T Stadium, which can accommodate about 94,000 fans for a World Cup match, offers more seating than any other 2026 venue.

“That means, at least in theory, Dallas offers nearly 850,000 chances to catch the competition across five group stage matches, two round-of-32 matches, one round-of-16 match and one semifinal match,” The Times notes.

Matches will be played from June 14-July 14 at AT&T Stadium.

If you’re unable to snag a World Cup ticket, The Times recommends visiting the World Cup fan festival at Fair Park, an event that’ll offer live music and retail-time viewing of soccer matches. The fest is expected to draw an estimated 100,000 soccer fans per day.

Another World Cup alternative pointed out by The Times: Halperin Park. The elevated park, adjacent to the Dallas Zoo, will span I-35E and reconnect a divided Oak Cliff neighborhood. The park’s three-acre first phase, scheduled to open this spring, carries a price tag of $112 million.

One local event The Times didn’t mention is an exhibition opening June 13, the day before the Cup’s kickoff, at Dallas’ African American Museum. Mandela: The Official Exhibition will celebrate the life and legacy of human rights champion and one-time soccer player Nelson Mandela, the late South African president.

Dallas-Fort Worth is projected to see a $400 million economic impact from the nine local Cup matches. In all, 16 North American locales are hosting Cup matches this year.

“There is no greater sporting event in the world than the FIFA World Cup, and there is no greater place than Dallas to host it,” Monica Paul, executive director of the Dallas Sports Commission, said in a 2024 news release. “The matches will bring unprecedented attention to Dallas, attracting hundreds of thousands of fans to our region for the largest and most inclusive World Cup in the tournament’s rich history.”

Dallas isn’t the only place in the U.S. to be recognized by The New York Times as a top travel destination for 2026:

Eighth-ranked Route 66, which marks its 100th anniversary this year. A 178-mile portion of the iconic highway winds through the Texas Panhandle.
16th-ranked Los Angeles, which is hosting eight World Cup matches this summer.
19th-ranked Memphis, Tennessee, where the redesigned Legacy Building at the National Civil Rights Museum will be unveiled this spring. The Legacy Building is the former boardinghouse where Dr. Martin Luther King’s assassin lay in wait across from the Lorraine Motel.
Southwest Florida’s 26th-ranked Sanibel and Captiva islands, where many establishments underwent renovations in the wake of hurricanes in 2022 and 2024.
Chicago’s 27th-ranked Hyde Park, where the Obama Presidential Center is scheduled to open this year.
30th-ranked Portland, Oregon, where an indoor food market, an expanded art museum, and a new WNBA team are debuting in 2026.
Alaska’s 33rd-ranked Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a pristine wilderness that covers 19.6 million acres, and has no roads, established trails, or cellphone service. Last year, the U.S. Interior Department authorized oil drilling at the refuge.
36th-ranked Medora, North Dakota, where a library dedicated to President Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt, an ardent conservationist, opens this year. The library overlooks Theodore Roosevelt National Park.
40th-ranked Deer Valley, Utah, a ski resort that’s undergoing a major expansion.
42nd-ranked Bentonville, Arkansas, home to the world headquarters of Walmart and an expanding Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, founded by Fort Worth billionaire and Walmart heiress Alice Walton.
50th-ranked Virginia Beach, Virginia, which is hosting the first-ever Super Girl Festival, an all-female sports extravaganza. Another draw is the $350 million Atlantic Park Surf wave pool, which opened in 2025.
51st-ranked Big Sur, California, where a landslide-damaged stretch of picturesque Highway 1 is slated to reopen in March.

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