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Print Friendly MapThe Arnold City Park Trail follows former residential streets through a wooded area along the Meramec River in a southwestern suburb of St. Louis. It forms a loop that begins and ends at the gravel road at the northeastern corner of Arnold City Park that connects Hollywood Beach Road and Bradley Beach Road. The pathway east of the gravel road (as shown in the trail map) is closed to vehicular traffic. The pathway west of the gravel road is shared with vehicles, although traffic is minimal.
The park offers a nice place to relax after your journey with a fishing lake, athletic fields, picnic pavilions and BBQ pits.
Parking is available in Arnold City Park (2101 Bradley Beach Road).
Today was my second ride on this trail. Love it, but the railroad crossing was kind of iffy my first time out. Today, I got to the crossing & apparently they are improving it because all of the wood is gone & I had to carry my bike over each individual rail. The mud from the flooding is dried up, too. Can't wait to see how they improve he railroad crossint.
This is a Arnold, MO hidden city gem. New areas have new black topped areas. Peaceful walk. Beautiful scenery. When a train goes buy take a rest and take some cool photos.
The 2-mile description is deceptive as that only covers the portion cut off to motor vehicles. There is a full, mile-marked 5K course although it does include roads within the park. Not much traffic though. Runs along the Meramec river and really nice scenery, peaceful and wooded if you like to be one with nature (unless a train comes through but that can be a nice change of pace as well). A small low-lying portion can be prone to flooding in the spring. There is also a shorter, separate paved trail within the main park area featuring a lake and adjacent to a disc-golf course (good for mulch-running if no players are present) and doggie park. I'm partial because it's near my home but I think this is a terrific park.
The total distance for this loop is 3.7 miles if you take the entire loop. The road behind the fences (cut off to vehicular traffic) is not maintained and can be rough in areas, and will have mud on the road after a significant rain. But it runs close to the Meramec river, so the scenery is great and the wildlife is abundant. There are also a number of unpaved old residential roads that can be traveled and explored. There is an active rail line that crosses one of the roads, the crossing is horrible, and you do need to watch for trains. The shared road is maintained and traffic is minimal. The road has a 15mph speed limit. For the area closest to the park where traffic is more frequent, paved lakeside trails are an alternative to the main road. This is my favorite trail.
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