President Donald Trump holds a model of an arch monument during a ballroom dinner in the East Room at the White House in Washington, D.C., October 15, 2025. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
Another of President Donald Trump's vanity construction projects just got hit with a reality check, with the Park Service warning that his massive "triumphal arch" could, per The New Republic, "ruin just about everything near it."
Amid his broader push to remake Washington D.C., in his own image, Trump has been pushing through numerous construction projects in the nation's capital, with one of the more ostentatious among them being a 250-foot arch, a structure heavily inspired by the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. The structure is slated to go up at Memorial Circle, a traffic circle across the Potomac River from the Lincoln Memorial and situated near Arlington National Cemetery.
Critics have already warned that the massive arch, a great deal larger than most structures in Washington, would disrupt the city's skyline and block certain iconic vistas. Now, his own Parks Service agency has dealt the project a reality check, warning of the disruptions it will cause to the area.
"It would disrupt the symbolic relationship between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery, obstruct sightlines from the Kennedy Gravesite and Robert E. Lee’s home, and alter what official documents call 'one of the most magnificent' views in Washington at the National Cathedral four miles away, the Park Service said," the New York Times detailed in a Monday report. "The Park Service is supposed to seek ways to reduce such 'adverse effects' on historic sites under the National Historic Preservation Act. But the arch is expected to move forward with little change given that Mr. Trump has shown no interest in the most obvious remedies — scaling down the project, or building it somewhere else."
In its own report on the Parks Service assessment, The New Republic summed up the warning as saying the arch could "ruin just about everything near it."
Ed Stierli, the vice president for government affairs with the National Parks Conservation Association, spoke to the Times for its report and said that "adverse effects" translates to "you’re building something that will irreversibly harm the experience in these other locations."
In a letter to the Parks Service in June, Roger W. Kirchen, Virginia’s State Historic Preservation Officer, warned that these disruptions were intentional on Trump's part.
“These adverse effects are intentional and inherent in the design of the arch," he wrote. "It is intended to dominate the surrounding landscape."