The City of Swartz Creek operates numerous park facilities. The two largest parks, Abrams Park (formerly Winshall) and Elms Park, offer many recreational amenities including baseball, soccer and softball fields, basketball, volleyball, pickleball, and tennis courts, and play yard equipment for children of all ages. The parks also offer a full range of accommodations for groups such as restrooms, pavilions and BBQ grills. In the winter time, Elms Par, Abrams Park, and Otterburn Park offer sledding, and an ice skating pond is created at Elms Park.
Elms Park is also the sole host for the area dog park, youth athletic programing, and the Cosmos In the Creek solar system model. This model is a one-mile long scale model of the solar system, which commences with the sun station at the front of Elms Park and ends with the Neptune station at Otterburn Park. The walk is on an improved surface and includes nine local stations that represent the sun and eight planets. In addition, a tenth station representing our closest neighboring star closes out the model. See the Neptune sign station to learn more!
In addition to Elms and Abrams (formerly Winshall) Parks, the City maintains a small park downtown, Michael R. Shumaker Bicentennial Park. This park provides a first come- first serve pavilion to residents. Otterburn Park is North of Bristol Road and east of Elms Road and consists of 20 acres and soon will have Disk Golf and a sled hill. A pavilion, restrooms, and other park amenities are expected for Otterburn in 2025 or early 2026. Veterans Memorial Park is located on Paul Fortino Drive. The Michael R. Shumaker Bicentennial Park is a small pocket park located along Morrish Road, just south of Miller Road, in downtown.
Swartz Creek offers great and improving trail connectivity as well! Elms and Otterburn Parks are both on the expanded Genesee Valley Trail, which connects Swartz Creek to the Genesee Valley Mall area, Downtown Flint, and beyond. A connector also leads to Elms School to the north. There is also a creekside trail connector between Morrish Road in downtown and Fairchild Street school campus district along the north side of the creek. The trail system will be having trailhead maps and wayfinding signs installed in early 2025. Most neighborhoods and major streets in the city offer sidewalks and bikelanes for safe and convient connections to downtown, schools, businesses, and residential areas.
Reservations for City of Swartz Creek Residents ONLY are taken beginning on January 2nd and must be paid for at the time the reservation is made. Non-City Residents begin on March 1st and must be paid for at the time the reservation is made. You can download the Park Reservation Form above. Due to popularity, weekend reservations for many of the pavilions are booked as soon as mid-January or February. It is recommended that reservations for large parties are made well in advance. Fees for reservations vary depending on location, pavilion and resident/non-resident status.
