Keith-Wiess Park – Houston’s Hidden Gem 

This is a beautiful, nearly 500-acre park in the middle of Houston’s north side. The paved trails are wide and wind nicely through the forest and around the central pond.

On December 1, 2013, students from nearby Aldine MacArthur High School were jogging at the park in the 12300 block of Aldine Westfield Road when they spotted a man dead with gunshot wounds to his chest. Police are looking for a shooter. This is a fantastic article to read.

Park History

Keith Wiess Park east of Aldine Westfield Road is a series of large, connected detention basins disguised as a nature park with soccer fields, trails, piers, and boardwalks. The City of Houston owns the park. It’s part of the Halls Bayou Greenway, which will provide nine miles of public open space from Brock Park to this park.

Feral hogs are known for creating mayhem in rural, semi-rural, and suburban parts of Texas by tearing up fields and lawns in their search for worms and roots to eat. When they started wreaking havoc in this City of Houston park, District staff contacted Jeff Baker and his always-on-call crew from Houston Hog Removal to help round up the troublemakers.

Real estate in this neighborhood is made up of mostly medium-sized (three or four-bedroom) to small (studio to two-bedroom) single-family homes and mobile homes. The housing vacancy rate in this neighborhood is 6.3%, which is lower than the average vacancy rate of 95.2% of all neighborhoods in America.

Park Amenities

Whether you want to stroll by a lake, jog through an urban forest, or kayak down a bayou Houston has it all. In fact, the City of Houston is a national leader among cities of its size for the number of parks and green spaces it has.

At a recent East Aldine District networking luncheon Kirk Hooper, Director of Parks for Harris County Flood Control District gave a fascinating presentation on the development of Keith-Wiess Park, a 500-acre City of Houston Signature park with walking trails, soccer fields, and tennis courts.

One of the most significant features of this park is a system of large detention basins that were developed to help control flooding downstream of Hall’s Bayou. These beautiful ponds are designed to look as natural as possible and have been planted with native wetland species that also function to filter and slow stormwater runoff. The results have been nothing short of amazing. This park sets a new standard for joint-use outdoor recreation-stormwater detention facilities in southeast Texas. Visit another area in town here.

Park Activities

The park is a beautiful, scenic, and recreational environment that provides a variety of recreational opportunities. However, recent incidents involving crime and a tragic death have brought attention to safety considerations during late evenings and nights. Therefore, it is important for visitors to stay informed through media and make alternative arrangements during these hours.

The City of Houston’s signature Keith-Wiess Park is a natural area featuring miles of trails, old forest habitat, and large ponds for flood detention. Harris County Flood Control District constructed a major detention basin in the park that removed more than 1,770,000 cubic yards of dirt to store stormwater downstream of Halls Bayou.

The paved trails are wide, well designed, and wind throughout the forest with lots of variety. The ponds are large and offer great views of the trees and wildlife. The park is a wonderful secret gem in Houston. During the mornings and daytime, it is a place where families can relax, jog, or stroll and create cherished memories together.

Park Map

If you’re looking for a neighborhood in Houston where you can relax by a lake, jog in an urban forest, or kayak down the bayou, look no further than Keith-Wiess Park. This nearly 500-acre City of Houston signature park offers surprising variety for its size and is a hidden gem in Houston’s north side.

The paved trails wind through old-growth forests and around large retention ponds designed to appear as natural as possible. This gives you a nice variety of scenery in a relatively short “barbell”-shaped loop and also provides some seclusion from the nearby highways.

The ponds are home to a variety of fish and wildlife that make for great viewing, even on cloudy days. The ponds are connected to Halls Bayou by a neat bridge and help control flood water in the area. The ponds are also used for stormwater treatment, a good use of the natural resources in this area. Continue reading about Houston Interactive Aquarium & Animal Preserve.

 

Driving directions from Geek Window Cleaning to Keith-Wiess Park

Driving directions from Keith-Wiess Park to Houston Interactive Aquarium & Animal Preserve