Frazier Park

Frazier Park is a Mecklenburg County neighborhood park at 1201 West Fourth Street Extension, about a mile northwest of Trade and Tryon. Seventeen acres, by the county’s own boundary data. Two different dog rules apply inside it, depending on where the dog is standing.

Outside the fence, leashed. The county’s greenway rule is one sentence: “Dogs must be on a 6ft or shorter leash and should be walked on the right edge of the trail.” Irwin Creek Greenway has an entrance here, listed in county records under Frazier Park at 1123 Greenleaf Avenue, so that rule is the operative one on the paved trail. Section 26 of the parks ordinance adds that it is “unlawful to have pets in the areas of County parks where pets are expressly prohibited.” Playgrounds and athletic field areas are on that list. Frazier has a playground.

Inside the fence, off-leash. Frazier is one of four dog parks Park and Recreation lists, and the rules are written for the program rather than the site: open daily 7:30 a.m. to sunset, current vaccinations as a condition of entry, no children under the age of 12. Owners “must follow all posted dog park rules,” which makes the sign at the gate the document that counts. Ninth Street Dog Park, roughly a mile east in Fourth Ward, runs under the identical rules.

What the county doesn’t publish about this particular dog park: its acreage, whether it’s divided for small and large dogs, whether there’s water on site. Third-party directories describe all three. None of it appears in the county’s rules, so this listing doesn’t carry it.

Two details from the county’s park record. Parking is a thirty-space lot. There are no restrooms, and the record marks the park as not ADA compliant.

The hours don’t line up with each other. The county lists the park’s operating hours as “daylight,” its greenway rules say the trail “is open at all times, except for floods or repairs” while “parking lots are open from dawn to dusk,” and the dog park closes at sunset, which in December is mid-afternoon.