Accessing high-quality climbing in the Pittsburgh region is now easier than ever, with the creation of the new Boyce Bouldering Park last October. The collaborative effort between the Allegheny County Department of Parks, Boulder Solutions and Walltopia Climbing Walls was a unique opportunity to offer a public bouldering area that is free for anyone to use and was spearheaded by climbers.
The boulder park itself is in a sprawling area that is complemented with a skatepark and a pump track. Large trees, foliage, and grassy areas for families to sit and play surround the gravity sports park. While the climbing section of the park isn’t the first of its kind—free-to-use outdoor climbing walls have been built in public parks before—the bouldering at Boyce does stand out in terms of the professionalism that went into the project and the quality of the final product.
An Expert Collaboration for a Growing Sport
From the beginning, the intention of all involved was to ensure that anyone could walk up to the walls and participate—no equipment needed. In preparation for the project, the Pennsylvania Environmental Council (PEC) and Environmental Planning & Design (EPD) conducted a study around gravity sports and the rise in climbing’s popularity, which has been highlighted in several Outdoor Participation Reports of the Outdoor Industry Association.
According to figures in the Outdoor Foundation’s 2017 Outdoor Participation Report, for instance, when looking at a 10-year timeframe, participation in indoor climbing grew from 4.5 million to 4.9 million participants and participation in outdoor climbing increased by nearly 50%, from 2 million to 2.8 million participants.
The findings from the PEC and EPD’s study supported the conclusion that climbing is a growing, thriving sport—as are other outdoor and gravity sports—and so it deserved to be given a spotlight in the city’s recreational parks system. The Allegheny Parks team went to work right away, and soon local gym owner Dean Privett, Boulder Solutions and Walltopia were brought into the conversation to help take the project to another level.
Unlike many climbing walls on kids’ playgrounds, the Boyce Bouldering Park is a true climbing area that was built to challenge even the more experienced climbers. Adam Koberna, President of Walltopia USA, was involved in the design of the aesthetic boulders, and he shared how willing the County parks department was to turn the park into a legitimate climbing destination. “We pushed what we wanted to see as climbers, and they never said no,” said Koberna. “They wanted to do it the right way.”
State-of-the-Art Design and Construction
The Boyce Bouldering Park project certainly has been done the right way. Not only is the climbing area visually inviting, but it can withstand the elements for year-round climbing thanks to Walltopia’s premium design. According to the Walltopia website, the walls are “made with pressure-treated outdoor-purposed plywood, hot-dip galvanized structure, stainless steel and hot-dip galvanized fasteners. Designated roofs are placed on each boulder to protect the panels, holds and climbers from the weather impact.” In total, there are seven bouldering walls at the park, offering over 6,000 square feet of climbing challenges.
To complement the wall design and engineering, there is a masterful touch of routesetting by Dean Privett himself. “As a routesetter, I tried to drive the aesthetics by the routes instead of the walls,” he said. Rather than the usual, smaller plastic holds that are typically added to outdoor walls in public parks, Privett chose holds that took up visual space, including brand-new volumes and macros. “The goal was to create something that attracts someone from farther away and brings them in,” continued Privett.
Privett—who is the owner and founder of Boulder Solutions and Iron City Boulders, a local Pittsburgh climbing gym—felt that everything came together at the right time. He had been dreaming of a similar project for a while and was thinking of ways to make it happen when the opportunity for Boyce was presented to him. “There’s a bit of serendipity around this project,” he shared. “In 2022, I learned that Boyce Park was planning on building an artificial climbing structure. I quickly followed up. It took five phone calls to talk to Joel.”
The Allegheny County Parks Landscape Architect, Joel Perkovich, was immediately an advocate for creating a bouldering area where people could recreate and the sport would be accurately reflected. “There was a study done by the Pennsylvania Environmental Council to look for ways to expose people to outdoor recreation,” Perkovich explained, referencing the aforementioned PEC study. “A lot of the [boulder parks] out there charge admission, and we decided to make this free of charge. That was essentially the purpose of the report—identifying a need and removing barriers to entry.”
A Public Space Open for Everyone
In addition to the design of the space that allows for the park to function as an outdoor bouldering gym, there is an element of play and sport at the park that transcends experience and age. While many gyms try to separate birthday parties and kids’ areas from the rest of the gym, Boyce embraces that variety. “There’s always kids sitting on top of the top-out boulders. I saw a family throwing a football while the other kid was climbing…Every parent I see pulls onto the wall. People are recreating together in this space,” said Privett. Only a few yards away from the bouldering park, there are cyclists on the pump track, skaters at the skatepark, and families sitting on the grass or playing in the adjacent playground. Someone could spend an entire day at Boyce without ever getting bored. The project’s lead designer, EPD, worked collaboratively with the Parks Department, Walltopia and Boulder Solutions to develop a plan that would artfully weave together the different gravity sport facilities in an aesthetically pleasing way, while also enabling universal access and providing other necessary functions, such as responsibly managing stormwater runoff with rain gardens and native plant landscapes.
Alongside the dreamy vision of climbing on a sunny day in the neighborhood, the little gray cloud that might hover in the background is the question of liability. The answer to this concern is only a few yards away, at the skatepark. Dedicated skateboarding facilities exist in many Pittsburgh-area parks, yet skateboarding comes with risk too. “There are people smashing themselves on concrete and we’re talking about kids dropping four feet onto rubber,” Privett pointed out with some humor. It’s true—skateboarding has paved the way for climbing as a recreational, gravity-based public sport. When parents, kids and adults show up to skate, they understand there is risk and skating etiquette is to be passed down and followed. The same is true for bouldering parks. There is already an understanding of risk in climbing and it’s part of why many people love the sport. However, risk was still highly considered throughout the design of the project and minimized where possible. “We have 12” of shredded rubber nuggets, the tallest wall is 15 feet, there’s tons of cushion,” said Perkovich, noting a few of the precautions the team took when designing the space. Signage also clearly communicates to climbers that users assume liability for using the boulder walls.
The other burning question accompanying the project is about the possibility of taking away business from local gyms. The industry professionals who worked on the project, however, feel confident the park will only grow people’s interest in climbing. Privett painted the picture well: “This bouldering park could allow someone who wouldn’t usually rock climb to try it.” Maybe someone gets started at the park, he explained, and then starts looking for more opportunities to learn by seeking out the nearest gym. Or maybe the weather might encourage parents to look for indoor opportunities. “Kids love climbing at the park and now it’s snowing, so they go and try the nearest gym and eventually become members,” suggested Privett. In other words, the vision for Boyce doesn’t include a scarcity mindset—it’s expansive and an open invitation to all.
This is the spirit of what makes Boyce so special and why it could be impactful for years to come. From day one, success wasn’t revenue driven but was instead defined by what the County Parks Department could offer the community—a sentiment that many climbers would share and is connected to the heart of the sport. That might be what the Boyce Bouldering Park really is: a heartbeat in a city, with a flow of climbers, parents, the curious passerby, and kids gripping plastic for the first time—all coming together to try something new. Rather than what can be gained, it is about what could be experienced and giving everyone the opportunity to try.
This story was paid for by the sponsor and does not necessarily represent the views of the Climbing Business Journal editorial team.
