Briant Park
Briant Park
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4.5
18 reviews
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AnnArborMichigan
Ann Arbor, MI173 contributions
Aug 2023 • Solo
I love this park because I enjoy seeing other walkers and runners of all ages, colors, and shapes. The path is well-paved and scenic. In addition to the dogs being walked, you might occasionally see deer or rabbits. Two small hills and it’s winding nature keep the path interesting. In addition, you have the opportunity to take two very short side paths paved with pea gravel through the woods. I walk and run there in the early morning and look forward to two loops around. Lots of benches, a water fountain for humans and dogs, and two porta-potties. The covered area looks inviting for a picnic. I highly recommend a visit!
Written 19 August 2023
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
MitchPhyllis65
Morristown, NJ7,369 contributions
Aug 2022
A coworker and I used to walk around Briant Park pond during lunch time for some good exercise and then I retired. Today I came back 20 years later with my wife to see what the park looked like. It sure changed with some nice improvements. We parked on the street next to the Summit entrance and walked the paved trail around the park, and the pond which is now pretty much covered with vegetation and may die off during the winter months. This is still a lovely community park with a lot of open space along with covered areas for shade and picnics. It brought back some good memories.
Written 19 August 2022
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
GMarieB
1 contribution
Jul 2019
I love Briant Park and I think it was designed by the Olmsted firm which I understand designed central park in NYC. However it needs to be dredged and downed trees taken care of. Also growth around pond looks like it is invasive and needs to be removed before it moves further into the pond.
Written 23 July 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
BruceF86
Jersey Shore, NJ9 contributions
May 2021
First, this park is in Summit. Perhaps a much-less used part is in Springfield. However, just try and access the park without parking in Summit or walking into the Summit section of the park. Good luck! Of course, you can park alongside the park in Summit and walk right in, stepping in the primary park land that is also in Summit. So call it where it is - Summit.
How is the park? It used to be a little gem for wildlife. Otherwise, it offered a reasonable place for picnics at a few tables (with metal grills in place) or spreading out blankets on the grass and sunning with your family or friends. The park is popular for its walking/jogging/biking loop of about 0.8 miles that goes around the central pond.
If you like sterilized parks, this park will become more and more to your liking. Several years back, the park was selected for further development by Union County. Unfortunately for wildlife lovers and those who love quiet parks, Union County is strongly dominated by a city population demographic. Democratic government leads to this greater fraction of people electing representatives to decide how parks get used. Sadly, I think many just don't understand what the park had to offer and how unique that was, given the small size of the park.
Now Union County has predictably begun eroding the natural diversity and pseudo-wildness of the park. I have personally seen about FIFTY different species in that park. I would bet good money that the urbanization plan (sorry, "beautification") is driving some of those species away forever.
First off, the county put additional trail coverage deeper into the quietest section of the park, increasing the frequency and proximity of human disturbances for the deer, birds (e.g., buteos, accipters, flickers, woodpeckers). That is not too bad in that the trail is CURRENTLY not used as much, since it is gravel-surfaced while the main loop is asphalt. That may change
Second, but much worse, in my opinion, the county pretty much just stripped down many trees, and nearly all the brush and grasses that lined the banks of the pond and its two feeder streams. Unless they plan on replacing those with other kinds of vegetation of equal value to the wildlife, I think that is a sad decision indeed. Many types of birds as well as wildlife like frogs, snakes, turtles, raccoons, muskrats and foxes used this vegetation for natural cover and food sources. Not so much any more. I suspect the county does not want all those natural things getting in the way of a sterile clear view of the dead pond.
Sorry, did I say the pond is dead? It is not quite dead. It is typically PACKED with carp. I don't know how they survive there are so many. There would be more natural aquatic wildlife, but the artificially raised and annually stocked carp regularly eat nearly ALL of the other aquatic animals born in the pond. The carp are not native to ponds like this. They are ruinous! Sadly, some people enjoy "getting out to nature" by fishing for artificially trucked-in fish that are so packed into the pond that when the water is low, you can practically walk across on the carp. I am NOT joking. You can see them crammed together, wallowing and wriggling as a giant mass when the water levels drop in summer and fall. It seems that artificial city feel is what matters to those in charge.
I suspect the county officials want to increase public usage quotas, attracting the city residents who would consider a half-dead juniper bush to be "wildlife". I get it. To them, if it's not gray concrete, steel, or glass, then it's a natural place. If the county could only just put in twenty basketball courts with spectator bleachers, they could get even more people to show up and count their development program as a resounding success. Why even bother with grass? (OK, I am being cynical. But it seems to me the urban design approach is preferred by the county.)
The county has already have attracted larger party groups by building a large gazebo. That means the park will NOT be attracting as many herons and warblers. Nature is not too fond of loud boom boxes blasting tunes for quinceañeras and graduation parties. Likewise, relaxing visitors lounging in the park are finding themselves wanting to retreat further from noisy events more often than in the past. So much for preferring the sounds of frogs and ducks over club music in a park.
As I recall, some in the county even got a great idea to basically drive away any remaining aquatic wildlife. Someone had the "great" idea of bringing in canoes to this tiny little pond. Seriously, you could cross the pond using just a few strong paddle strokes! Turtles and egrets like to distance from people. With canoes, they would have NOWHERE to hide. I have not heard more about the canoes, but I also didn't hear the plan has been cancelled.
Union County will get the park it deserves. It will have a sterile urban landscape if the politicians never appreciate what a little gem Briant Park was. I think if you look at the bird diversity, that will tell you a lot. At the birding website ebird.org, I anticipate the average species per checklist will go down as the years go by. Too bad. I have probably seen 50 different species there. I suspect you won't see the yellow warbler there anymore as I did several months each spring and summer. The vegetation it regularly hung out in is gone. The red-winged blackbirds are also out of luck. The extensive common reeds of the pond (invasive phragmite) seem to be largely removed. Those reeds were a blackbird habitat (other species surely enjoyed them as well). I have not seen the county replace the reeds with an equally useful species (native preferred). I will miss those shimmering black birds with beautiful red-and-yellow "epaulets" on their shoulders. Likewise, the green herons that would visit like to avoid people by going into the heavily reeded section. It's gone. It seems all that vegetation and the wildlife it supported has been removed so the formerly natural setting could be converted into a recreation and event space. Cie la vie. I have since moved from Summit to a nearby town, but I don't miss the park much, not since it got worked over. :-b
How is the park? It used to be a little gem for wildlife. Otherwise, it offered a reasonable place for picnics at a few tables (with metal grills in place) or spreading out blankets on the grass and sunning with your family or friends. The park is popular for its walking/jogging/biking loop of about 0.8 miles that goes around the central pond.
If you like sterilized parks, this park will become more and more to your liking. Several years back, the park was selected for further development by Union County. Unfortunately for wildlife lovers and those who love quiet parks, Union County is strongly dominated by a city population demographic. Democratic government leads to this greater fraction of people electing representatives to decide how parks get used. Sadly, I think many just don't understand what the park had to offer and how unique that was, given the small size of the park.
Now Union County has predictably begun eroding the natural diversity and pseudo-wildness of the park. I have personally seen about FIFTY different species in that park. I would bet good money that the urbanization plan (sorry, "beautification") is driving some of those species away forever.
First off, the county put additional trail coverage deeper into the quietest section of the park, increasing the frequency and proximity of human disturbances for the deer, birds (e.g., buteos, accipters, flickers, woodpeckers). That is not too bad in that the trail is CURRENTLY not used as much, since it is gravel-surfaced while the main loop is asphalt. That may change
Second, but much worse, in my opinion, the county pretty much just stripped down many trees, and nearly all the brush and grasses that lined the banks of the pond and its two feeder streams. Unless they plan on replacing those with other kinds of vegetation of equal value to the wildlife, I think that is a sad decision indeed. Many types of birds as well as wildlife like frogs, snakes, turtles, raccoons, muskrats and foxes used this vegetation for natural cover and food sources. Not so much any more. I suspect the county does not want all those natural things getting in the way of a sterile clear view of the dead pond.
Sorry, did I say the pond is dead? It is not quite dead. It is typically PACKED with carp. I don't know how they survive there are so many. There would be more natural aquatic wildlife, but the artificially raised and annually stocked carp regularly eat nearly ALL of the other aquatic animals born in the pond. The carp are not native to ponds like this. They are ruinous! Sadly, some people enjoy "getting out to nature" by fishing for artificially trucked-in fish that are so packed into the pond that when the water is low, you can practically walk across on the carp. I am NOT joking. You can see them crammed together, wallowing and wriggling as a giant mass when the water levels drop in summer and fall. It seems that artificial city feel is what matters to those in charge.
I suspect the county officials want to increase public usage quotas, attracting the city residents who would consider a half-dead juniper bush to be "wildlife". I get it. To them, if it's not gray concrete, steel, or glass, then it's a natural place. If the county could only just put in twenty basketball courts with spectator bleachers, they could get even more people to show up and count their development program as a resounding success. Why even bother with grass? (OK, I am being cynical. But it seems to me the urban design approach is preferred by the county.)
The county has already have attracted larger party groups by building a large gazebo. That means the park will NOT be attracting as many herons and warblers. Nature is not too fond of loud boom boxes blasting tunes for quinceañeras and graduation parties. Likewise, relaxing visitors lounging in the park are finding themselves wanting to retreat further from noisy events more often than in the past. So much for preferring the sounds of frogs and ducks over club music in a park.
As I recall, some in the county even got a great idea to basically drive away any remaining aquatic wildlife. Someone had the "great" idea of bringing in canoes to this tiny little pond. Seriously, you could cross the pond using just a few strong paddle strokes! Turtles and egrets like to distance from people. With canoes, they would have NOWHERE to hide. I have not heard more about the canoes, but I also didn't hear the plan has been cancelled.
Union County will get the park it deserves. It will have a sterile urban landscape if the politicians never appreciate what a little gem Briant Park was. I think if you look at the bird diversity, that will tell you a lot. At the birding website ebird.org, I anticipate the average species per checklist will go down as the years go by. Too bad. I have probably seen 50 different species there. I suspect you won't see the yellow warbler there anymore as I did several months each spring and summer. The vegetation it regularly hung out in is gone. The red-winged blackbirds are also out of luck. The extensive common reeds of the pond (invasive phragmite) seem to be largely removed. Those reeds were a blackbird habitat (other species surely enjoyed them as well). I have not seen the county replace the reeds with an equally useful species (native preferred). I will miss those shimmering black birds with beautiful red-and-yellow "epaulets" on their shoulders. Likewise, the green herons that would visit like to avoid people by going into the heavily reeded section. It's gone. It seems all that vegetation and the wildlife it supported has been removed so the formerly natural setting could be converted into a recreation and event space. Cie la vie. I have since moved from Summit to a nearby town, but I don't miss the park much, not since it got worked over. :-b
Written 10 May 2021
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
laurencat
Mountainside, NJ88 contributions
Apr 2019 • Friends
Nice, friendly place with walkers, runners, kids, families, dogs and one guy who walks his parrot!
There's also a fitness circuit.
There's also a fitness circuit.
Written 25 April 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
coachmikec
Chatham, NJ393 contributions
Aug 2017 • Business
This park is very nice because it has: a 1 mile (exactly) paved loop, water fountain, porta potty and nice open fields. The gazebo is used for exercise and to get shade, and the park overall is wonderful. One issue is that the town of summit has restrictions on turning down the main road during traffic times and they started to enforce it. So it's just harder to access, but it's a great park!
Written 23 August 2017
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Ray P
Edison, NJ137 contributions
Sept 2016 • Couples
This is a park alongside a nice neighborhood run by the Union County Parks & Recreation department. It has a Parcourse Fitness Trail, you can go fishing in Briant Pond. There are picnic tables and oldish charcoal grills. Lots of people walk their dogs here.
Written 25 September 2016
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
gnachonj
Union, NJ111 contributions
May 2021
Nice 1 mile paved walk party around a pond stocked with fish. About half of the 1-mile walk is in shade depending on the time of the day.
Written 28 May 2021
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Bob S
Springfield, NJ179 contributions
May 2019 • Couples
Nice park with one mile paved path. Along path there are exercise stations where you can stop and try different stretches and exercises. There is a gazebo, pond, and wooded area, and large open space with grass. Popular for runners, walkers, and sledders when snow is down.
Written 9 May 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
glenparis
5 contributions
Aug 2018 • Couples
Beautiful walk. 1 mile all paved. Shade and sun.
Open spaces and small alcoves. Never too busy. Easy parking.
g
Open spaces and small alcoves. Never too busy. Easy parking.
g
Written 4 August 2018
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Can you ride bikes there, little kids ?
Written 28 April 2021
It is a county park. It is open every day during daylight hours. There are no gates, doors, or anything like that. It is located in the midst of a neighborhood of single family homes and low-rise apartment buildings.
Written 25 November 2016
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