In recent years, the area has seen large condominium-complex developments built which overlook the Lake, marinas, and centrally located 30-acre (120,000 m2) West End Park.

The area is immediately north of the site of the levee failure on the 17th Street Canal during Hurricane Katrina, which was a primary cause of the inundation and devastation of many neighborhoods in New Orleans.

Located outside of the flood walls, West End experienced some severe damage, but it was limited to heavy winds and high water destroying the restaurants and music clubs built on piers over the lake.

Because West End was developed above sea level, the neighborhood only flooded due to the storm surge coming in from Lake Pontchartrain.

(In the 20th century, the amusement park was moved to a newer stretch of reclaimed land and became part of a large, privately owned complex called Pontchartrain Beach.)

The oldest point-to-point sailing regatta in the Western Hemisphere, the Race to the Coast was formed on July 4, 1850 by Southern Yacht Club and took their start at Dan Hickock's Lake Hotel at West End before transiting the Rigolets Pass through the marsh leading into Lake Borgne and finishing at a pier near the Montgomery Hotel along the Mississippi Sound in Pass Christian, Mississippi.