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By KT Ryan
Divorced, a little broken and newly relocated to Menlo Park, I was not exactly eager to fall in love again — at least not with people. People, I had learned, could ruin your life in an instant.
So instead, I fell in love with a game. Pickleball.
I now spend many of my waking hours smashing, dinking and delicately dropping bright green balls exactly where I intend (and, admittedly, exactly where I don’t). Somewhere between the third-shot drops and the unforced errors, something unexpected happened: The people swinging paddles around me restored my faith in humanity.
Nealon Park has become a second home to me — not because of the courts themselves, but because of the incredible community that gathers there to play: students, octogenarians, recent immigrants and lifelong Menlo Park residents. People recovering from cancer, people grieving spouses. Some of us come for therapy, some come for joy, and some come for fitness. Most come for a mix of all three. All of us come because this public space has quietly become a lifeline.
Together, we’ve grown into a pickleball community of more than 1,000 players in our Nealon Park Facebook group alone. We’ve committed to the sport, to each other and to this place.
The city of Menlo Park has yet to do the same.
Pickleball at Nealon Park has been confined to Court No. 5, a single converted tennis court the city still describes as a “pilot program,” though it was introduced here in 2020. More than half a decade later, that label no longer fits. This is not a trial run; it’s a proof of concept. Yet the setup remains provisional: temporary nets that frequently need replacing, a playing surface crisscrossed with overlapping tennis and pickleball lines, and overhead lights that are reliably unreliable.
While other Peninsula cities are actively building new pickleball courts to meet exploding demand, Menlo Park appears frozen in a prolonged state of indecision over Nealon’s Court No. 5. The City Council, city manager, Library and Community Services (LCS), and Public Works staff have the authority and resources to consider improvements at Nealon Park. Aside from the notable exception of Public Works, which recently replaced broken nets and added some bench seating, meaningful action keeps getting postponed. Meetings are held. Studies are discussed. Momentum stalls. It’s as if the city keeps pointing to the sky and calling “rain delay,” even on a cloudless day.
Both the City Council and the city manager have cited noise as a key concern to any progress. I get it. I live nearby too, but residents deserve thoughtful solutions. Not civic inaction.
Early in 2024, the City Council directed staff to review and implement short-term noise-mitigation solutions at Nealon Park. Nothing seemed to happen. Later, the city proposed pursuing a feasibility study — costing up to $85,000 — to analyze locations for pickleball courts, including evaluating the impact of the sport’s noise. That’s a lot of money to confirm two well-known facts: Pickleball is popular, and pickleball makes noise. At some point, studying the issue becomes a substitute for solving it.
How about funneling those funds directly toward improving the courts for maintenance, safety and noise?
Cities across the country — and even nearby, like Holbrook-Palmer Park in Atherton — have addressed the pickleball noise. Sound-dampening fencing, enforced restricted hours and strategic court placement are not radical experiments; they are proven tools.
It’s past time for Menlo Park to implement noise abatement at Nealon Park’s Court No. 5. This might be for the short-term, by erecting a noise barrier along the residential-facing fence and by installing lighting that reliably shuts off at 10 p.m. (to enforce the permitted court hours of play), thereby ensuring peace for nearby neighbors. Long-term solutions may be to relocate the pickleball courts further away from residents.
Can the broken lights on the tennis courts be fixed, too? Tennis and pickleball are not mortal enemies. Many players carry both rackets and paddles in the same bag and want Menlo Park to care for players’ safety across all its courts.
After multiple years of requests, meetings, and patience, I’m hoping for a little more city investment in pickleball.
I’m committed. Hundreds of us are. We’ve found community, healing and joy on these courts. In a time when loneliness is common and civic trust is fragile, that is no small thing.
Menlo Park, how can we work together on this?
I’m not quite ready for another broken heart.
KT Ryan is a Menlo Park resident.
