Sports and nature in Brighton
Meridian Centre Park
It’s a little difficult to find this park (at least for non-Brighton resident me), because it’s tucked back off the west side of Winton Road, behind the Meridian Centre Office Park (officially 2025 Winton Road South). For that matter, there’s not even any dedicated parking. You’re pretty much parking in the office park lot, but there’s plenty of space.
Clearly this is one of the town’s main sports complexes, packed with soccer fields, little league and softball fields and basketball courts. There’s a concession building with bathrooms, a few picnic tables and a playground which was totally empty on this sunny Tuesday summer afternoon. The website adds that there’s “tennis court availability,” which confused me until I saw the courts. The nets were lying on the ground. Perplexing.
There are trails, and apparently they have recently been expanded. I say this because the only map of the park I can find online is a blueprint for an expanded trail system which seems to 10 years old (but it’s hard to read). I don't reprint it here because despite examining it several times, I couldn't find a recognizable feature on it telling me where I actually was.
I took the shorter trail, which basically just skirted the edge of the sports fields. These “trails” were little more than walking paths -- more like maintenance access roads, actually, very gravelly and wide enough for trucks. There was a point where the trail went through the spacious wooded area to the west of the park, but much of my .8-mile walk was out in the open.
The photos below show a typical section of the trail, a random picnic table and maintenance house in a clearing along (too far away for normal picnickers to use; I expect maintenance workers use it), and an box on a numbered pole along the trail, also random. The box was empty, except for a spider and trash, and the number corresponded to no materials I could find.
There are more trails in these woods, but I don't know which are new and which are old. Google Maps seems to indicate that they too are wide and gravelly. They might be nice to jog, but I wouldn't really consider them “nature” trails. These longer trails do, however, connect to the Erie Canal Heritage Trail, which adds a lot of potential.
Below are images of the playground, a new butterfly garden and the concession stand.
Buckland Park
Buckland Park is located on Westfall Road between S. Winton and S. Clinton. This is a great park to bring kids to, in large part because there are three playgrounds, each adapted for different age groups. This is another very well-tended sports complex, complete with a major league baseball field, two junior baseball fields, five multi-use fields, basketball courts, tennis courts, soccer fields and a volleyball net.
It has a very nice concession/restroom facility, a lodge and a pavilion. A banner at the entrance to the park indicated that weekly summer concerts are held here.
There’s a mile-long walking path which encircles the park, passing by the baseball fields, the Brighton Community Garden and the historic Buckland Farmhouse. It’s sometimes paved, sometimes gravelled. I only walked about a quarter of this path, but it was probably the most interesting section of the path, as it passed through a section of wetlands replete with cattails and wildflowers.
Brighton Town Park
Brighton Town Park was a delightful surprise. It’s like Brighton took one of their town’s most beautiful features -- a 12-acre pond -- and wrapped a beautiful nature park around it.
The park is just a bit farther west down Westfall Road, nestled into the Rt. 590/390 interchange. So basically it’s in one of the busiest parts of town, which is why its natural beauty was so surprising.
Brighton Park covers 28 acres. It has a softball field, a playground (which was very busy when I was there), a lodge with bathrooms and two pavilions.
There are basically two trails here. I took a shorter one, which wound through the wooded area on the park’s east side. This was a delightful little walk. Aside from the constant highway traffic noise, I’d rank it up there with any number of longer, more undeveloped nature trails. It was a bit root-y, but level enough for younger children to navigate. There were plenty of birds and trees and just plain nice scenery, especially when you get down by the pond. At a little less than a half mile, it’s also a good length for kids, plus there are a few benches along the way where they can rest.
The second trail is an almost 1-mile long loop around the pond. This does not appear to go through woods, so it’s less a nature walk than a biking/running/walking path. If you continue west off of this path as it turns back towards the main park, this path will take you to the Erie Canal Heritage Trail.