Pearsall Park has already pulled off one remarkable transformation: turning a former landfill into a place people choose to spend their weekends. Now, the San Antonio park is preparing for another turn, with a new adaptive bicycle track planned at 5102 Old Pearsall Road.
A state construction filing lists $3.2 million for a BMX track and associated site work. Behind that straightforward description is a bigger idea: expanding the ways people can ride at a park whose history is anything but ordinary.
Pearsall Park’s unlikely beginning as “Mount Trashmore”
Before the trails and public art, there was the dump. KENS 5’s coverage of the park’s 2016 debut recalled the local nickname “Mount Trashmore,” a less-than-glamorous name that makes today’s landscape all the more striking.
The change took years of planning. Bender Wells Clark Design’s project history describes the challenge of making disturbed land around the old landfill mounds into an inviting public space. The firm’s master-plan work earned a Texas ASLA Merit Award in 2015, followed by a Texas Recreation and Park Society design award for the park in 2017.
In June 2026, the city celebrated ten years since the park’s transformation. The 505-acre destination now gives visitors reasons to linger, from its skate park and disc golf to space for dogs and their people. It is quite a second life for land once associated with throwing things away.
A bike idea more than two decades in the making
Look closely at the conceptual master plan below. Dated around 2000, it already identifies a mountain-bike and BMX area, along with nature trails, hilltop overlooks and connections along Leon Creek. Cycling was part of the vision long before this latest construction filing.
That drawing is a historical concept, so its labels should not be read as a list of amenities being built now. But it captures the ambition behind the park: give the hills and open land a new purpose, with different reasons for neighbors to return.
The latest filing also names Bender Wells Clark Design as the design firm, connecting the upcoming work to a practice with a long history at Pearsall Park.
What the new Pearsall Park track would offer
The city’s track announcement describes paved, gravity-driven slopes with jumps, rollers and banked curves. ADA-accessible starting gates and accommodation for BMX, mountain bikes and recumbent bikes are central to the adaptive-use design.
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s grant announcement also includes lighting, shade structures and work around the track perimeter. Those supporting features matter, too: a riding destination needs places and infrastructure around the course as well as the course itself.
Even away from the pedals, there is plenty to catch the eye. The city identifies Buster Simpson’s Wickiup installations and Doroteo Garza’s Ujuālnān (Grand Sky), a planetary sculpture series, among the park’s public artworks. A visit can move from exercise to an art walk without leaving the grounds.
Funding and the construction calendar for Pearsall Park
The city’s bond project page lists a $3.4 million total budget, combining $1.9 million from the 2022 bond program and a $1.5 million state grant. The separate state construction registration lists a $3.2 million estimate for the track and site work.
The TDLR filing, TABS2027000811, estimates construction from November 15, 2026, through August 15, 2027. Its 163,602-square-foot figure describes the registered outdoor project scope, rather than a new building.
The city’s published schedule extends from fall 2026 into winter 2028, which its calendar defines as January through March. Those estimates differ, and neither should be treated as a confirmed opening date.
For a place once nicknamed “Mount Trashmore,” the next starting line feels like a fitting addition. Pearsall Park’s story keeps finding new ways to turn an unlikely landscape into somewhere people want to go.