Homestead Metro Park Is Now 376 Acres. Here's What Hilliard Can Use This November

You can walk across the covered bridge at Homestead Metro Park this week, circle the 2.5-acre fishing pond and come back past the train station replica and the two barns. All of that is the park as it has been for years. On paper, though, the park you'd be walking through is now 376 acres. Homestead covered about 43 acres before this year.

So where are the other 333 acres, and when can you walk them?

The second answer matters more for a November weekend, and it is less exciting than the headline. Metro Parks plans to restore most of the new acreage as wetland, prairie and forest, and no one has said when trails will open on it. The part of this deal more likely to reach residents sooner involves trails Hilliard already uses, which Metro Parks is set to take over for maintenance and patrol.

A unanimous vote and a much bigger map

In late September, Hilliard City Council voted unanimously to transfer 333 acres of city-owned and private land to Columbus and Franklin County Metro Parks. The Columbus Dispatch described the result as Homestead growing "nearly eightfold."

The city first introduced the transfer on Sept. 14 and expected a vote at the Sept. 28 council meeting. It called the deal the result of years of planning among the city, developers and Metro Parks. The Metro Parks page for Homestead already lists the new total. It says the expanded park will add trail connections and protect natural habitat, and it mentions future prairie and wetland areas.

The park's address hasn't changed. It's still 4675 Cosgray Road. What has changed is how much land sits behind that entrance, and where that land came from.

The land came out of Hilliard's newest neighborhoods

Hilliard didn't buy a farm to get these 333 acres. It assembled them piece by piece from residential developments, under a rule council adopted in 2023. That policy requires 70% of the land in new developments in this area to stay open space. According to the city, that is higher than the 50% standard used by other communities in the Big Darby Accord.

The city's release and NBC4's coverage name the developments that supplied the land:

1. Hill Farm and Hill Farm II, by M/I Homes. The conservation land here includes the headwaters of Clover Groff Run. Council approved Hill Farm II in March 2025 as a 300-home extension of the original Hill Farm near Elliott Road, and 186 of its 265 acres are set aside as open space.
2. Clover Meadows, by Fischer Homes. Council approved a separate transfer of about 35 acres from this development to Metro Parks in June.
3. Tarlton Meadows, by Pulte Homes and Rockford Homes.

The city says the assembled land is connected by shared-use paths. The expanded Homestead is made of conservation land set aside within new neighborhoods, tied together by paths.

Assistant City Manager Dan Ralley put it this way in the city's announcement:

"By prioritizing open space as our community grows, we have created an opportunity to permanently preserve hundreds of acres of land and expand access to nature for generations to come."

Under the 70% rule, the land set aside in these developments now becomes parkland managed by Metro Parks.

Why most of it is for restoration first

The new acreage is in the Big Darby Creek watershed. Hilliard's release calls it one of central Ohio's most environmentally significant areas, and one that has drawn a lot of attention as development continues in western Franklin County. Metro Parks plans to naturalize the land "in a manner consistent with best practices for the Big Darby watershed," meaning it will restore wetlands, native prairie and forest across the new parcels.

Visiting will look different from the Homestead you know. The city says the new land will focus on conservation and "more passive experiences with nature," possibly including boardwalks and natural-surface trails, while the existing park keeps its current recreation. NBC4 reported that neither agency gave a timeline for those improvements.

Homestead's official acreage changed with one vote. The boardwalks and footpaths that would let you explore the new land are still possibilities with no date attached.

Tim Moloney, Metro Parks' executive director, said in the city's release that the partnership "will have a long-lasting impact not only on Hilliard, but on the region and beyond."

The trail handoff in the same proposal

The proposal also included a trail agreement. Before the vote, NBC4 reported that the legislation included an agreement for Metro Parks to operate, maintain and patrol designated regional trails, and that these routes include about 2.4 miles of the Heritage Trail south of Hayden Run Road, plus a trail that runs from Homestead through nearby subdivisions to Scioto Darby Creek Road.

Under that agreement, Metro Parks would assume routine maintenance and patrol costs for those routes, and the two agencies would keep coordinating on major construction and renovation of trails on city-owned land.

This connects to Homestead's best-known feature. The park's paved loop links to the 6.1-mile Heritage Rail Trail. As proposed, Metro Parks would look after the park and the stretches of trail running out of it, toward Scioto Darby Creek Road and along the Heritage Trail below Hayden Run Road.

If your neighborhood connects to those paths, this is a practical change. It's about who maintains the trails you already walk, and it doesn't depend on any new trail opening.

November at Homestead

Everything on the November calendar happens in the part of Homestead you already know. Metro Parks lists several free programs at the park this month. None of them require registration.

The Litter Clean Up is the easiest way to help with the park's upkeep in its first season at the new size. The Beaver Moon Hike starts at 5 p.m., which is close to dark this time of year. Homestead is on winter hours from Oct. 1 through March 31, open 6:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. In summer it stays open until 10 p.m.

Further down Cosgray Road, the city's other big recent investment on this corridor has its own November date. The Well, Hilliard's recreation and wellness center at 3993 Cosgray Road, opened in September 2025. On Wednesday, Nov. 11, at 11:30 a.m., it hosts the city's first Veterans Day Luncheon, an indoor event that replaces the former Veterans Day Parade. Both addresses are on Cosgray Road, so you can fit both into the same day.

When the boardwalks and natural-surface trails do arrive, they'll lead into the wetland and prairie Metro Parks plans to restore on land from Hill Farm, Clover Meadows and Tarlton Meadows. For this November, the covered bridge, the pond loop and the Heritage Trail connection are still the way in.

Living near a park that just got this much bigger, or near the trails Metro Parks is set to look after, can change how buyers see a home, and that's worth understanding before you list. If you've wondered how being close to Homestead or the Heritage Trail affects your home's value, I Care Home Group would love to walk you through it. Call Us for a Free Home Valuation.