A lot of parks in this city are sort of homogenized into an ur-Vancouver celebration of mountains and waters in lieu of quirks that celebrate local demographics or history, which is a roundabout way of saying we hecking LOVED that Beaconsfield Park has a giant pizza oven available for use; a nod to the Italian Cultural Centre next door and the community’s historic* importance in the northeast quadrant of the city. 

(The Park Board as a whole hasn’t really emphasized the Indigenous history and subsequent colonial expropriation of its parks in any visible way, so that legacy is not really a visible part of any park experience, which is the main reason it doesn’t really come up in many of our writeups, for better or worse)

Aaaanyways, the pizza oven is one of the big reasons that Beaconsfield, just south of Grandview Highway and Slocan, is a touch above most “fields and playground” parks in the city.

Not the only reason though. There’s the expansive community garden, the secluded basketball court, the way the dense treeline and slope separates the main sports area from the rest of the park. It’s also one of the main headquarters for the thousands of crows that congregate in east Vancouver/west Burnaby most evenings, which may or may not be a plus depending on your point of view. 

The park’s weak spot was an old and pedestrian playground; but that was recently upgraded to become thoroughly modern, with accessible slides, multiple inventive climbing structures, and slides and sand pits for smaller children. 

All of which is to say: Beaconsfield is a really nice large neighbourhood park, and those who live nearby are lucky to have it.