In Hopkins, cleaning up the creek and cleaning up the city go hand in hand.

Officials gathered Thursday to celebrate the beginning of work on an expanded city park and a new effort to reclaim the most heavily polluted stretch along Minnehaha Creek's 22-mile length. The area along North Blake Road also has a history as the highest-crime neighborhood in Hopkins.

But the city and the Minnehaha Creek Watershed District are reclaiming the area as part of a long-range plan to rehabilitate the creek in Hopkins and St. Louis Park. A number of rundown commercial and residential buildings along the creek have been bought and torn down, opening up the creek banks to public view for the first time in decades. The demolition also allows open land along the creek to improve water quality by filtering runoff before it reaches the stream.

Cottageville Park will be expanded to three times its current size, with new play equipment, trails, lighting, a community garden and new landscaping. Razing the old, graffiti-ridden buildings has helped improve the neighborhood, said Hopkins police Chief Mike Reynolds. Before the rehab effort started, the neighborhood accounted for 4 percent of the city's population — but 20 percent of its crime. Since the improvements began to take place, crime in the area has fallen by 25 percent.

Hopkins Mayor Gene Maxwell thanked the watershed district, the Metropolitan Council and the state of Minnesota. All have contributed to the project.

"No city can do projects like this without partners," he said.

John Reinan • 612-673-7402