Neil Weintraub calls Buffalo Park "second to none"

Buffalo Park Perspectives

by Neil Weintraub

March 5, 2020

(Neil Weintraub was born in New York City and received his B.A. in Anthropology from Grinnell College, Iowa. He began his career in archaeology at the Museum of Northern Arizona in 1986. For the past 26 years, Neil has been an archaeologist for the Kaibab National Forest. He enjoys teaching his co-workers, partners, and local youth about the importance of protecting and preserving cultural resources. Since 2001, Neil has served on the Big Brothers Big Sisters of Flagstaff board and mentors his little brother RJ at Willliams Elementary School. Neil also enjoys trail running. He helped co-found Northern Arizona Trail Runners in October 2001 and continues to serve as a Director. NARTA will stage its 1000th organized run this year.)

As a native New Yorker, I was born steps from what most would call the world’s premier city park, Central Park in the heart of New York City. As a lifelong runner, I spent early Saturdays as a kid mimicking Dustin Hoffman’s Marathon Man scene when he frantically raced around the 1.6 mile Central Park Reservoir loop trying to catch every other runner ahead of him. As for most New Yorkers, Central Park is sacred ground, a place to escape. The Central Park reservoir loop has 360 degree sweeping views of skyscrapers that frame the park.

When I arrived in Flagstaff in the mid-1980s, there were headlines about a proposed highway going through Buffalo Park. On my first run around the park’s two mile outer loop, I could not help but realize the striking comparisons to Central Park; only this expansive view had no skyscrapers, just the stunning expansive 360 degree vistas with the San Francisco Peaks watching over me.

After I made that fire run around the 2 mile loop with its breathtaking views, Central Park no longer topped my list of premier parks. My new home had its own that was without doubt, second to none.

While Buffalo Park was a pretty quiet place 35 years ago, there were a regular band of runners and walkers. I knew I wanted to live near the park, so in 1988 when I left my chicken coop at the Museum of Northern Arizona, I rented an apartment at the end of North San Francisco Street, right at the foot of Buffalo Park. That would be my backyard for the next six years and I ran that loop countless times. As an archaeologist, my mind often drifted back in time and I wondered what the park would have looked like when it was a tourist attraction in the 1960s.

Today the park is filled all hours with folks from all walks of life who no doubt have the same passionate feelings. As Flagstaff’s lofty elevation has attracted world class athletes from globe that train in our thin air, locals often rub elbows with famous professional runners and Olympians.

It is incomprehensible to think that back in the mid-1980s the City was entertaining a proposal for highway bypass of the city connecting Cedar Avenue to Highway 180 that would have severed and divided Flagstaff’s greatest open space. I am for one am grateful for the small band of concerned citizens who had the foresight to take action to save the heart and soul of Flagstaff.