Cunningham Park

Cunningham Park — eastern Queens woodland with singletrack and a century-old motor road

Three hundred and fifty-eight acres of oak woods, ballfields and glacial hollows sit in eastern Queens, cut across by expressways and stitched back together by an overpass built for mountain bikers. More than two thirds of Cunningham Park is left wild — forest, vernal pools and kettle depressions on the same moraine that runs the length of Long Island — and threaded through it are two things you will not find in another New York City park: about six and a half miles of volunteer-built singletrack, and a surviving stretch of the Long Island Motor Parkway, the private toll road William Kissam Vanderbilt II opened in 1908 as the first highway in the world built for automobiles alone.

Highlights

• The mountain bike trails — roughly six and a half miles of cross-country singletrack, hand-built from 2007 onward and still maintained by CLIMB, the Concerned Long Island Mountain Bikers, with help from IMBA Trail Solutions and volunteer corps. Trails are signed beginner through advanced, there is a dirt-jump area, and two major sections are joined by an overpass across the Clearview Expressway.
• The Vanderbilt Motor Parkway remnant — a paved bicycle and walking path laid directly on the roadbed of the Long Island Motor Parkway, which opened on October 10, 1908 as the first road anywhere built exclusively for cars, with banked turns, guard rails, reinforced concrete and grade-separated crossings instead of intersections.
• The wild interior — over two thirds of the park is preserved woodland with vernal pools and kettle ponds, the same knob-and-kettle terrain the Wisconsin ice sheet left behind, and it holds amphibians and breeding birds that need undisturbed ground.
• The ballfield complex — around twenty-five baseball diamonds, plus cricket and soccer fields, giving the park one of the densest concentrations of organized field sport anywhere in the borough.
• The tennis centre — roughly twenty courts between outdoor play and covered winter play, so racquet season here does not stop when the weather turns.
• The Cunningham memorial — a flagpole set in bronze on an inscribed stone base, erected in June 1936 for the young comptroller the park is named after.

What you’ll find

Cunningham Park is really three parks divided by roads: the Long Island Expressway runs through it, the Clearview Expressway crosses it, and the Grand Central Parkway bounds it. That fragmentation is the reason the wild sections stayed wild, and the reason the mountain bike overpass matters so much — it is the stitch that turns two separate woodlands into one continuous ride.

• Signed mountain bike loops for every level, from wide smooth beginner track to technical singletrack with rock features and log-overs.
• The paved greenway on the old motor parkway roadbed, running about two and a half to three miles between Cunningham and Alley Pond parks and linking into the wider Brooklyn–Queens Greenway.
• Baseball, softball, cricket and soccer fields in near-permanent weekend use by leagues from across eastern Queens.
• Two bocce courts, basketball courts and playgrounds spread across the developed sections.
• A dog run with separate fenced areas for large and small dogs.
• A free weekly community run of about 2.7 miles, hosted with New York Road Runners and open to walkers as well.

Things to do — and who it’s for

• Mountain bikers — the best legal singletrack inside New York City, signed by difficulty, with a dirt-jump area and enough variety to keep a rider busy for hours.
• Beginners on a bike — genuinely gentle green-level loops, and total elevation change across the park of only about forty feet, so no climb lasts more than a few pedal strokes.
• Walkers and history-minded cyclists — the motor parkway path is flat, paved, traffic-free and lets you ride on a road built for the Vanderbilt Cup era.
• League players and families — an enormous field complex where weekend baseball, cricket and soccer run all day.
• Tennis players — a rare New York park where covered courts keep the season going through winter.
• Nature walkers — quiet oak woodland, vernal pools and breeding birds well away from the expressway noise, with far fewer visitors than the borough’s famous parks.

Getting there & practical

The park sits in eastern Queens, wrapped by Fresh Meadows, Oakland Gardens, Hollis Hills and Bayside Hills, and it has no subway station of its own — this is bus and bike country. The F train reaches Jamaica–179th Street, from which local buses continue east to the park’s edges; city buses including the Q30, Q31 and Q46 stop along the perimeter. Cyclists can arrive on the Brooklyn–Queens Greenway, which uses the old motor parkway roadbed and links Cunningham directly with Alley Pond Park. Entry to the park, the woodland and the mountain bike trails is free. Tennis court time requires the city’s seasonal permit or a single-play ticket, and indoor court time under the winter cover is booked separately. The grounds are open daily from early morning until 1 a.m., but the trails are a daylight activity — there is no lighting in the woods. Allow an hour and a half to two hours for a ride, or an hour for a walk on the greenway and a loop of the quieter woods.

When to visit

Spring is when the vernal pools fill and the woods are loudest with breeding birds, but it is also the muddiest season, and riders are expected to stay off soft trails until they dry. Summer gives long evenings, full ballfields and deep canopy shade over the singletrack, which makes this a far more comfortable ride than an open park in July. Autumn is the best all-round window: firm dry trails, cool air, oak and hickory colour across the moraine, and the greenway at its most pleasant for a long flat cruise. Winter empties the park out and hands the woods to walkers and hardy riders; the trails run well when the ground is frozen hard, badly when it is thawing, and the covered tennis courts and the sledding slopes on the higher ground carry the rest of the season.

Good to know

The city bought this land in 1928 and originally called it Hillside Park. Its present name honours W. Arthur Cunningham, who was elected New York City Comptroller in 1933 and died of a heart attack in 1934 at the age of thirty-nine; the Board of Aldermen voted to rename the park for him in 1935, and a memorial flagpole set in bronze on an inscribed stone base was erected in June 1936. The park’s most remarkable inheritance, though, is the road running through it. William Kissam Vanderbilt II — great-grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt — had been staging the Vanderbilt Cup races on public Long Island roads, and after spectators were killed he financed a private highway where cars could run without meeting anything else. The Long Island Motor Parkway opened on October 10, 1908 with an initial stretch of about ten miles and was the first road in the world built exclusively for automobiles: reinforced concrete, banked turns, guard rails, and grade-separated crossings so that it had no intersections at all. It reached Lake Ronkonkoma by 1911, ran about forty-five miles of the seventy originally planned, cost roughly six million dollars, and charged a toll that began at two dollars and had fallen to forty cents by the end. Public parkways built with taxpayer money eventually made it pointless, and in 1938 it closed and was handed to New York State against unpaid back taxes. In Queens the roadbed survived, and today it carries a bicycle and walking path of roughly two and a half to three miles linking Cunningham Park with Alley Pond Park as part of the Brooklyn–Queens Greenway. The mountain bike network is the park’s modern layer. Trails have been hand-built here since 2007 by CLIMB — Concerned Long Island Mountain Bikers — with technical help from IMBA Trail Solutions and labour from volunteer corps including Green Apple Corps and AmeriCorps alongside Friends of Cunningham Park. The result is about six and a half miles of signed cross-country singletrack in two main blocks linked by an overpass over the Clearview Expressway, ranging from smooth beginner loops to tight technical lines with rock features and log-overs, plus a dirt-jump area. Total elevation change across the whole park is only around forty feet, which makes the riding fast, punchy and unusually friendly to single-speed bikes. Everything of that network depends on volunteer labour, which is why trail closures after rain are taken seriously here.

Visitor tips

• Check trail status before riding after rain. The singletrack is volunteer-built and volunteer-maintained, and riding it wet does real damage — closures are posted by the trail crew and are not advisory.
• Start on the greenway if you are new here. The old motor parkway roadbed is flat, paved and easy to follow, and it gives you the lay of the park before you commit to the woods.
• Plan for buses, not the subway. There is no station at the park; the F train to Jamaica–179th Street plus a local bus is the standard approach, and arriving by bike on the greenway is often faster.

Questions & answers

Is Cunningham Park free? Yes. The park, the woodland, the mountain bike trails and the greenway are all free and open daily from early morning until 1 a.m. Tennis courts require the city’s seasonal permit or a single-play ticket, and covered winter court time is booked separately.

Can you really mountain bike in New York City here? Yes — this is the city’s principal legal singletrack. Roughly six and a half miles of cross-country trail have been hand-built since 2007 and are maintained by CLIMB, signed from beginner to advanced, with a dirt-jump area and an overpass linking the two main sections across the Clearview Expressway.

Are the trails suitable for beginners? Very much so. There are wide, smooth green-level loops, and because total elevation change across the park is only about forty feet, the biggest climbs take no more than a handful of pedal strokes. More technical lines with rock features and log-overs are signed separately.

What is the Vanderbilt Motor Parkway? The Long Island Motor Parkway, privately financed by William Kissam Vanderbilt II and opened on October 10, 1908, was the first road in the world built exclusively for automobiles — reinforced concrete, banked turns, guard rails and grade-separated crossings, with no intersections. It closed in 1938 and passed to New York State over unpaid taxes; the Queens roadbed is now a bike and walking path.

How long is the greenway path through the park? Roughly two and a half to three miles of the old motor parkway roadbed survive as a paved path linking Cunningham Park with Alley Pond Park, forming part of the Brooklyn–Queens Greenway.

Who was Cunningham? W. Arthur Cunningham was elected New York City Comptroller in 1933 and died of a heart attack the following year, aged thirty-nine. The park had been acquired in 1928 as Hillside Park; the Board of Aldermen voted to rename it in his honour in 1935, and a memorial flagpole was erected in June 1936.

What sports facilities are there? Around twenty-five baseball diamonds, cricket and soccer fields, roughly twenty tennis courts split between outdoor and covered winter play, two bocce courts, basketball courts, playgrounds and a dog run with separate areas for large and small dogs.

How do I get there without a car? There is no subway station at the park. Take the F train to Jamaica–179th Street and continue by local bus; city buses including the Q30, Q31 and Q46 stop along the park’s edges. Cyclists can ride in directly on the Brooklyn–Queens Greenway from Alley Pond Park.

Is the park good for quiet nature walks? Yes. More than two thirds of its 358 acres is preserved woodland with vernal pools and kettle depressions left by the glacier, and it draws far smaller crowds than the borough’s better-known parks. Stay on marked paths, and give the mountain bike trails right of way where they cross.