At 644 acres, Frick Park is the largest of Pittsburgh’s city parks — and it feels gloriously wild. Ravines, woodland trails and meadow clearings stretch from Squirrel Hill to Regent Square, threaded by the Nine Mile Run stream and shaded by some of the oldest trees in the city.
Pittsburghers claim their own corners: the clay tennis courts and lawn bowling green near the Frick Environmental Center, the off-leash dog runs, the mountain bike trails, and the Blue Slide Playground, where generations of kids have zoomed down its famous painted slide. The Environmental Center itself — a net-zero-energy building near the Beechview entrance — anchors nature programs year-round.
The park was Henry Clay Frick’s gift to the city — he bequeathed the land in his will after his daughter Helen championed it — and it remains Pittsburgh’s great escape without leaving town. Access points dot the East End; start at the Frick Environmental Center on Beechwood Boulevard.
