Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Dog-Friendly St. Louis

Is there a dog park coming soon near your neighborhood?

St. Louis Dog Parks home page

Dog Parks in the works

There are presently efforts to bring new dog parks to the Southwest Garden neighborhood and possibly Wilmore Park.

Do you own a dog? Have you ever used a dog park? Would you use one of these?

RB

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'd use it if it's close enough to walk. Defeats the purpose to drive somewhere to exercise the dog.

Anonymous said...

I thought the purpose of a dog park was to socialize your dog as well as to exercise him/her. If you have children, you would drive them to friends' homes, so why not drive your dog to the dog park?

Claire Nowak-Boyd said...

I certainly have a friend who'd probably use a dog park in Fox Park, since he has a rambunctious terrier but no backyard (thanks to where the highway was put). Though I'm a cat person through and through, I think dog parks can be good.

I do wonder, though, who came up with the idea of putting a dog park in Lucas Park (I saw it on the link you posted, and have heard it mentioned before.). I work in the Children's Room of the Central Library, so I spend a lot of time with the park and the people who use it. I think that the park definitely needs to change. Many of the moms who stay in the shelters complain that it's no decent place for a child to be. From my own experience and stories I've heard from coworkers, I also know that it can be an unpleasant place for a young woman to walk alone. Still, many of the kids who are homeless that I work with love the park, and a lot of people just don't have anywhere else to go (esp. now that downtown is becoming more valuable and thus more controlled land). The value of Lucas Park to the St. Louis homeless community is undeniable. Everyone knows that Lucas Park is Hobo Park. So the fact that someone would propose to put a dog park THERE when there is so much dead green and paved space downtown is fairly offensive. If anyone wants to make a positive change in Lucas Park, start holding Larry Rice accountable for the way he runs his shelter, and you'll see a change. A dog park is not the solution, and suggesting that dogs deserve that land more than the homeless do is not right.