Williamsbridge Oval

I love my neighborhood park! This time of year I’m usually only in the rec center, but in the summer it’s so wonderful to see all the kids and families chilling and playing and enjoying being outdoors.
As far as what’s outdoors, there are basketball courts, tennis courts, a play fountain (on in the summer), a cute fenced-​in playground, dog run, and ¼ mile loop track with a turf field that folks use for soccer and football. Often when it’s a nice weather day, there is a snack cart or someone selling Icees. I kinda wish they had vendors with healthier options like fruit, though.
The recreation center was under renovation for a long time and re-​opened about a year ago. I joined right away, it’s fantastic! Membership is through NYC Parks & Recreation so it’s much cheaper than nearby private gyms. There’s a small but sufficient fitness room with treadmills, stair master, stationary cycles, ellipticals, weight resistance machines, free weights, yoga mats, medicine balls, and Pilates balls. There’s a tv in there as well; they always either have News12 or one of those Music Choice channels on.
Upstairs in the red center there’s a nice, big open multipurpose room. They regularly hold free classes and workshops there, from arts & crafts classes for kids to seniors yoga. They’ve got a weekly schedule of free Shape Up NYC classes; I’ve taken a Zumba class and a Cardio Kickboxing class and they were both fun. The instructors aren’t world-​class or anything, but I felt welcome and very comfortable dropping in.
So it’s no Prospect Park or anything, but as far as Bronx parks go, this one’s family friendly and mostly well-​kept. Check it out some time!

I almost got robbed for my iPhone 4 in front of this park. There is always kids smoking pot and others smoking cigarettes inside the park around other peoples children.

Beautiful park and it is undergoing a renovation. It now has a new track, new turf, and a new playground. Soon an updated rec. center will open. It needs some love and is definitely getting some from the active neighborhood people… visit and enjoy and support!

You best be careful during the day because there are a ton of unruly students playing hooky who hang out there, smoking pot and even one time, were causing chaos, throwing tennis balls at each other, while I jogged through them and almost got hit with one of them. But if you were to confront them, a gang of 20 15 year olds can definitely cause you a beating or worse. Yet the cops rarely patrol that park. Otherwise, it’s a nice park, but I suggest you go ONLY after 10am, when those brats who should be in school leave. That park is very nice considering it’s the «Bronx».

Through childhood play and teen-​aged hanging out, I’ve spent years of my life at the Oval. Like every day… and yet I struggle to describe it to people. Cause see, it once was a reservoir… so it’s a big, drained-​dry-​reservoir-​turned-​park. It’s like this double decker park… kind of.
There’s a running track at the sunken to the bottom of the reservoir, with a soccer field in its middle. Paved, tree-​shaded walks surround the lower-​level oval and lead you to playgrounds, basketball, tennis, and bocce courts and more. Walk up the stairs, or run up a grassy hill bowl, there’s the upper oval. After a good snow, we’d sled down them in our red plastic saucers, though there might be the danger of snow-​hidden dog sh*t. The top level strolls round, overlooking the park trough the trees, as neighborhood street scenes outline the rim.