Phillip Arnold Park & Tapeworm Mt Bike Trail

It’s a lovely place — a real neighborhood park, fully residential and hard to find. They’ve got a little league baseball diamond with fan stands, open fields, a gazebo, a tennis court, and a few benches. This place is small and nestled away, but it’s cute and the streets nearby get great views of south Renton below.

Small playground. Large open field. Public restrooms. Basketball and tennis courts. Ample parking. Covered picnic area with bbq area. Great place to have a get-​together with beautiful weather.

Awesome for my kid and family to just go for walk. BBQ is available as well. just need to reserve and just don’t show up you never know. parking is many many. Dog friendly as well. enjoy.

Ample parking and bbq areas. Open areas and not busy. Play area for kids and tennis courts. This place is awesome for small parties on a sunny day or just to play some soccer.

We had a work picnic at this park and it is AWESOME! I couldn’t believe how huge it was. They have a baseball field, tennis courts, a basketball court, a kids play area, and all sorts of grassy space for sports. There is also a pavilion for events, which we utilized during our picnic.
The park is beautiful, well-​maintained, and in a tucked away spot in Renton — I had no clue this park was here. It is truly a hidden gem.

Phillip Arnold Park is a 10 acre park with a baseball field, basketball court, tennis courts, and plenty of room to play. It’s hard to access from the old town because it’s on the OTHER (eastern) side of I-​405 and you need to take a fly-​over. Use google maps or a GPS to find it.
The park is a pretty nice neighborhood park, but that only rates it 3+ stars in my book. The 5-​star aspect of this park is that it is the jumping off point for some classic, very fun and technical mountain biking.
Where are the trails? You could SEE them from I-​405 if you were driving south near exit 2 (although it’s not convenient to access them from here). On I-​405, if you looked to your east, you would see some high-​voltage electrical lines coming down the hill. The trails are on the slope in the unbuildable easement underneath and near these lines. Thank god for the powerlines or some f’ing greedy developer would have developed the crap out of this area years ago. The area might not sound very scenic — and in a few spots it’s not with powerlines crackling overhead — but mostly it’s just trees, slope, and singletrack.
You can access the trails by parking at the Phillip Arnold Park parking lot. Ride south for about ¹⁄₃ mile on the access road. Look for trails to your right (west). Take any trail you might find or look for the fireroad. Back up in hyeah is the hilarity of Tapeworm, Parasite, Crop Circles and other trails. These trails are wooded, tight, twisting singletracks — back and forth, up and down — with obstacles like boardwalks, drops, ramps, teeter totters, fallen logs,. In spots you’ll get totally wedged up by crazy and stupid lines — drop down over a ½ dozen tree roots, suddenly make a tight climbing turn, go betwen two trees a handlebar’s width apart and then jump over a log.
In other newly developed parts (mostly to the southern end) you can find some trails with bermed turns, whoo-​dee-​doos, and a jump or two. Extra points if you can find «Declan’s Death Ride». The whole complex is fairly rideable in winter as the area drains well, but be careful not to tear up the trails when they’re wet and muddy. In the summer (especially in overgrown areas) you will want to ride with a patch kit and/​or Mr. Tuffy’s in your tires — lots of blackberry thorns on the trail.
These are classic east-​side trails — enjoy them safely and watch for other riders. Stop at Naan ‘n Curry in downtown Renton on your way home, have some delicious curry and say «hi» to Uncle Mike. I promise you’ll have a hard time wiping the huge grin off your face at the end of the day.
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