Empie Park

I’ve always had a great experience at the dog park, however today was a different case with a dog owner. The man’s dog immediately started fighting my dog the minute he opened the gate, and the man yelled at me to «GET MY DOG NOW» and then stated «My dog never has any problems with any other dogs except for Pit Bulls»…Funny thing about this is my dog is not a Pit Bull, in fact it would be hard to even mistake my dog as a Pit because she is a large Rottweiler. Not to mention my dog never once retaliated for his dog’s behavior. I probably wouldn’t have been so upset at the man’s behavior if after the fact he hadn’t taken his dog out of the park and let it loose outside the gates to run free while my 15 month old son was running around with his Dad. My tip here is if your dog has an issue with a particular breed, which is something I’ve never even heard of, maybe the dog park is not the place for you. To me it sounded like an excuse to blame a breed of dog for his dogs behavior. Lets take into consideration there could be any number of different breeds/​mixed breeds allowed in the park!

I love a park that i can bike to. Empie is off the cross city trail, and is easily accessible by bike. In fact, the cross city trail goes through the back of the park. It’s a great park with huge playgrounds, a massive tennis complex complete with quickstart lines for the kids, a dog run, ball fields, and even shuffleboard, bocce, and horseshoe pits. Oh, and picnic shelters.
It’s shaded in areas, with lot of pines. My son loves coming here. It does get very popular with the league tennis crowd as the other reviewer mentioned, but they have built numerous courts to try to compensate for the thousands (i kid not) of tennis players in Wilmington.

Recently moved to Wilmington, NC from Orlando, FL and started playing tennis at this City Park.
Pros: 1. Several courts 2. Fantastic Lighting 3. Run trail around park 4. Dog Park if you have a dog 5. Althea Tennis Center that has various programs and clinics for tennis
Cons: 1. My major issue with this place is that it is always full to capacity & when it isn’t and you get a court… you run the risk of someone walking up to you and saying «ummmm we have an appointment to play here at 6» and it is 5 till and you are in the middle of your game. This «City Park» doesn’t run on the 1^st come 1^st serve policy. You can go online and reserve a court for $ 3. Never had to do this at any other park with tennis courts that I have ever been too… new City & State… new rules.