PHILADELPHIA — Until just recently, if you asked the average Philadelphian how to get to Franklin Square, you'd likely be met with a blank stare. The park just north of Independence Mall had been virtually forgotten — until now.

A revamped and revitalized park opened to the public on July 31, after three years of work by a historical group that hopes to add another landmark to a district full of iconic sites.

But with two playgrounds, a carousel and a miniature golf course, this spot will be a bit more lighthearted than the monuments and museums that surround it.

"After a full day of enjoying history as they only can in Philadelphia, people will be able to go to Franklin Square and play," said Amy Needle, executive director of Once Upon a Nation, the group in charge of the project.

The group, which specializes in telling Philadelphia history through Colonial re-enactors, sees the square as a perfect opportunity to tie together several centuries of the city's past.

The 7.5-acre plot of land on the northern tip of Philadelphia's historic district is one of five squares in William Penn's original plan for the city. Since its construction in 1682, it has been used as a horse and cattle market, burial ground, ammunition storage center, military drill ground and, finally, a city park.

"William Penn always intended Philadelphia to have green space, and over history the city has reclaimed the square in one way or another to do that," Needle said.

But the once-elegant park fell off the city's radar screen in the late '70s, and its marble fountain was dry for about 30 years.

Part of the $6.5 million Franklin Square restoration project, primarily funded by a state grant, was designed to revitalize the park's vintage marble centerpiece. The fountain will be at the cross-section of four new landscaped paths and sport a 15-foot center stream.

The rest of the square's new features fan out from that central point, so that visitors walking out from the fountain in any direction will pass an attraction.

Two playgrounds lie to the southeast, one designed for young children and one for big kids.

To the northeast sits the "Liberty Carousel," which will take riders on a lilting ride past scenes of the city. The design of some of the ride's horses recalls Philadelphia's heritage as a carousel-making powerhouse. The city was headquarters to the world's three biggest carousel fabricators in the late 19th century, and many of the Liberty Carousel's animals will be modeled in the unique Philadelphia style.

And directly north of the fountain is the whole city of Philadelphia — in miniature.