Foothills Community Park 80304: Trails, Dog Park, Fields, Access

Jan 10, 2024 / Oct 9, 2026 · 8 min read · Outdoor Activities Dogs Paragliding 80304 ·

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Foothills Community Park: Where North Boulder's Biggest Lot Meets Open Trail

Foothills Community Park holds a fenced dog park, a soccer field, a multi-use field, two rinks — one for inline hockey and one now striped as four pickleball courts — and a basketball court on a single lot, then hands off directly to open trail climbing toward the foothills. The City of Boulder's own listing for Foothills Community Park puts the site at 65.2 acres in North Boulder, with three picnic shelters, two playgrounds, nature-play features built into the main play area, and the Growing Gardens plots covered in our Foothills Community Garden post.

Where is it? 800 Cherry Ave, Boulder, CO 80304 — in North Boulder, reached off North Broadway, with easy access to the city's Open Space and Mountain Parks trails.

The Dog Park

The park's fenced dog park is the feature most likely to bring a North Boulder household through the gate: about two acres, with a large-dog side of roughly 1.6 acres and a small-dog side of about half an acre, free and open from dawn to dusk, according to the City of Boulder's dog parks page. The rules, hours, licensing and what to bring are covered in our Foothills Dog Park guide.

Fields, Courts, and Two Playgrounds

Past the dog park, the rest of the property is built for scheduled and drop-in sport in roughly equal measure. The city's amenity list for the park includes a soccer field, a multi-use field, an inline hockey rink, a basketball court, and pickleball. The park has two rinks side by side, and the city describes its facilities as including an "inline hockey and pickleball rink": one rink stays set up for inline hockey, while the other, the large multi-use court, now carries pickleball striping for four dedicated courts, reservable from 7 a.m. to noon seven days a week; after noon, that rink reverts to general public and all-sport use, including hockey. Players need to bring their own portable nets — the city doesn't keep nets on site.

The park has two playgrounds. The main one, next to Shelter C, is built around nature play: the city's listing describes art structures throughout it, a polar sundial, a rock wall, and artistic designs worked into the sidewalk itself — physical features meant to double as climbing and exploring opportunities rather than a single manufactured play set. The second playground, smaller, sits with a small covered area south of the Growing Gardens plots. Sledding is explicitly allowed on the park's green areas in winter, per the same city listing — worth knowing for a North Boulder family without easy access to a steeper hill elsewhere.

Visitor reviews aggregated on MapQuest add a few details the city's own listing doesn't cover. Watching gliders come in over the fields is one of the things a MapQuest reviewer singled out. Other reviewers call out "big huge grassy areas" and pavilions described as "big and accommodating." The same address also hosts Living Arts Summer Camp, per the MapQuest listing, which puts a children's day camp on the same grounds during summer months alongside the regular park traffic.

Paragliding

The park is also a paragliding landing zone. Pilots launch from the hill above the end of Locust Avenue, on the far side of the park from the dog park, and come down onto the open fields — free to watch on a good morning. Three schools fly from the hill: Red Tail Paragliding, Wild Sky Paragliding and Boulder Free Flight. Our Red Tail Paragliding profile and everything else we publish on flying in North Boulder are on our paragliding page.

Restrooms and Picnic Shelters

The city's listing says the restrooms are open year-round, with limited hours in fall and winter, and lists drinking fountains, shade structures and paved paths among the park's features — unlike the Foothills Trailhead up North Broadway, which has no restrooms. The park has three reservable picnic shelters, A, B and C, with Shelter C next to the main playground; groups of 51 to 100 must reserve A and B together, and groups of 101 to 250 all three. A smaller shelter near the top of the rock slide is not reservable. Shelters can be booked for dates between the first weekend in May and Labor Day through the city's park shelter reservations; outside that window they are first come, first served.

A Gateway to the Foothills Trails — and Out to Boulder Reservoir

Foothills Community Park is a starting point for hiking into the hills north of Boulder, and the city's park listing notes its easy access to Open Space and Mountain Parks trails. According to the city's Open Space trail descriptions, the Foothills Trail runs about 3 miles: from the Foothills Nature Center west to Wonderland Lake, north along a dirt trail to Lee Hill Road, then on a gravel service road to the Hogback Ridge Trail and east to the Foothills Trailhead. Inside city limits, dogs on that trail must be kept on a hand-held leash at all times.

From the Foothills Trailhead the trail network keeps going east, all the way to Boulder Reservoir. The Eagle Trail crosses Boulder Valley Ranch for about 3.2 miles — a steep dirt path over a mesa, then a gravel ranch road — to the Eagle Trailhead on 51st Street, which the city's accessible trails guide places just northwest of the entrance to Boulder Reservoir. Walked end to end, that is a route from North Boulder's foothills out onto the open prairie and the reservoir's edge.

For a longer hike from the north end of town, the formal access point is the Foothills Trailhead at 5273 North Broadway, a separate City of Boulder lot with 22 parking spaces, no fee and no restrooms, open 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. From there the routes divide — Foothills North toward Wonderland Lake, the harder Hogback Ridge Trail (where dogs are not allowed) and the Boulder Valley Ranch trails to the east. Our guide to hiking the northern foothills trailheads from 80304 covers each trail, its distance and climb, and the dog rules at every trailhead; the Wonderland Lake watershed post covers the lake loop and its history.

The hillside west of the park has its own history. On July 19, 2002, a fire started just west of the Foothills Trail entrance, ran up the slope and crested into the Pine Brook Hill neighborhood; our sister site Boulder Weather has photos of the North Boulder fire burning at night and the helicopters working it the next day, along with how the burned slopes greened again the following summer.

Parking, Accessibility, and Getting There

Access at the community park itself is built around a car trip for most visitors, but not exclusively. The city's listing includes RTD Access among the park's amenities, meaning a rider on Boulder's local bus network has a stop within a reasonable walk of the site — useful for a household without a second car for a quick trip to the dog park or fields. Accessibility features listed for the park include ADA accessibility, shade structures, drinking water fountains, restrooms, and paved sidewalks and paths; a walking-route profile of the park from Pacer separately confirms wheelchair-friendly paths and dog-friendly areas as core features, alongside multiple parking lots and bicycle parking on site.

None of that changes the basic math for a family driving in on a Saturday: this is a large park with correspondingly large infrastructure, and a reviewer on MapQuest described parking as "easy and plentiful." The trailhead to the north runs on a different scale entirely — 22 spaces, no bathroom, built for hikers and riders rather than a full afternoon of field sports — and a visitor planning a long hike rather than a dog park stop should head there directly rather than parking at the community park and walking north.

Practical Information

Address: 800 Cherry Ave, Boulder, CO 80304
Phone: (303) 413-7200
Hours: dog park dawn to dusk (City of Boulder); restrooms open year-round with limited hours in fall and winter
Dog park: Free, dawn to dusk; 2 fenced acres with a large-dog side (about 1.6 acres) and a small-dog side (about 0.5 acre); city license and current rabies vaccination required; leash on outside the gates
Fields and courts: Soccer field, multi-use field, two rinks (one inline hockey; one striped as four pickleball courts — bring a portable net), basketball court; pickleball reservable 7 a.m.–noon daily, general use noon–close
Shelters: A, B, and C, reservable first weekend in May through Labor Day (11 a.m.–8 p.m.); groups of 51–100 must reserve A and B; groups of 101–250 must reserve all three
Parking: Large free lot on site, with multiple lots across the property
Accessibility: ADA accessibility, shade structures, drinking fountains, restrooms, paved sidewalks and paths; RTD bus access
Nearby trailhead: Foothills Trailhead, 5273 North Broadway — 22 parking spaces, no fee, 5 a.m.–11 p.m., no restrooms
Website: Foothills Community Park — City of Boulder

For an 80304 household, Foothills Community Park is less a single destination than a hub: a dog run big enough to wear out a social dog on a Saturday morning, enough fields and courts to fill a weekday evening, and a direct line onto the Foothills Trail for anyone who wants to keep walking once the leash goes back on. The formal trailhead to the north is worth a separate trip on its own terms — different parking, different rules, and considerably less company on the trail.