This study focused on the water quality of a river in Wuhan City, China, which is surrounded by ponds that were transformed into a bypass multipond wetland system to improve river water quality. The bypass multipond wetland system included surface-flow artificial wetlands, modified partition ponds, aeration reoxygenation ponds, ecological ponds, and other processes. After the stable operation of the process, the water transparency was higher than 60 cm and the dissolved oxygen (DO) was higher than 5 mg/L, while the ammonia nitrogen (NH3-N) concentration was less than 1.0 mg/L, total phosphorus (TP) was lower than 0.2 mg/L, and chemical oxygen demand (COD) was lower than 20 mg/L, achieving the treatment target. After monitoring the results of each process, the process which best enhanced the water transparency enhancement was the surface-flow of the artificial wetlands and ecological ponds. The aeration reoxygenation pond had the best effect on DO enhancement. The processes that most affected NH3-N and TP removal were the surface-flow artificial wetlands and ecological ponds. The modified parthenogenic pond had the greatest effect on COD removal. The bypass multipond wetland system not only improved the river water quality but also enhanced the river landscape, and can act as a reference for similar river water quality improvement actions.