The Long Island Greenbelt Trail Conference's directions for its guided Stillwell walk at 72 S. Woods Rd. tell visitors to park at the far end of the drive, on the far-right side of the preserve. The directions rely on landmarks because that is what the site offers. The same drive that leads to the trailhead also leads to the baseball and softball fields.
Stillwell Woods Park and Preserve holds two very different weekends in one footprint. The town, the county, a volunteer league and a petition with more than 3,300 signatures all have a stake in where one ends and the other begins. A boundary survey is meant to settle that line, and it has run far longer than anyone said it would.
One Entrance, Two Kinds of Saturday
Nassau County describes Stillwell Woods as a 270-acre preserve and multiple-use area. It includes old field and oak barrens habitat, the kind of plant and animal community that is more typical of eastern Long Island. The Nassau-Suffolk Greenbelt Trail for hikers runs through it, alongside bicycle and equestrian trails. News coverage of the park's ownership transfer puts the total at 287 acres. The two sources give different numbers.
AllTrails lists the Stillwell Woods Trail as a 4.1-mile loop with 223 feet of elevation gain, about an hour and a half to two hours at a hiking pace. It starts near the athletic fields. The longer Stillwell Woods Loop via Trail View runs about 7.1 miles and links into Trail View State Park. Cold Spring Harbor is visible from points in the preserve.
A hiking blogger who covered the preserve reports that the mountain-bike routes are typically muddy after rain or snow and that thick forest makes it easy to lose the way. AllTrails reviewers cite navigation issues and fast bikers as the main challenges. Those are the practical facts for a fall visit. Wear shoes that can handle mud, and carry a map or compass.
The field side runs on a different clock. Syosset Little League fielded 80 to 90 teams for roughly 1,000 children ages 3 to 17 in its 2025 season. League president Bradley Schnur has said the volunteers pay for landscaping and weekend field prep themselves. The trailhead and the fields sit at the end of the same drive.
The Line Nobody Painted
As the Long Island Press reported, Syosset resident Ron Ganz, who says he has advocated for the preserve for 25 years and started the "Save Our Stillwell Woods Preserve" petition, raised the boundary at the Oyster Bay Town Board's March 10, 2026 meeting. He told the board that no definitive markings separate the sports fields from the preserve.
The survey he was asking about was announced in September 2025. The Town of Oyster Bay hired GdB Geospatial of Melville for roughly $97,000. The town said at first it would take five to six weeks. As of March 2026, months later, it was unfinished. No later update turned up in this research, so the current status is a question for the Town of Oyster Bay directly.
The Long Island Press quoted Supervisor Joseph Saladino at that meeting:
"We're not looking to develop, we're not looking to change, we're looking to preserve."
Ganz disputed the town's cleanup record and said a section of protected woods had been cleared. Saladino immediately denied that any wooded land was cleared. Both men said they want the preserve protected. They disagree about what has happened so far and how quickly the paperwork should move.
That disagreement is a boundary dispute in miniature. A line that exists only in people's habits is easy to live with until someone has to build something.
Why Every Planned Upgrade Needs the Line First
The list of planned Stillwell improvements is long, and each item needs a footprint.
| Planned or announced item | What it needs to be settled |
|---|---|
| Dog park with separate large-dog and small-dog areas, backed by a $100,000 state grant secured through Assemblyman Jake Blumencranz | A site, plus parking. A town spokesman put the dog park and parking at $230,000 |
| New fields, parking lots and bathrooms, described in 2024 reporting as part of a further multimillion-dollar overhaul | A location for each that does not intrude on preserve land |
| The $12 million in total upgrades tied to the transfer agreement | A defined park area to spend it on |
The dog park was announced in 2024, and this research found no confirmation that it has been built, so it is best treated as planned. Each of those needs a site, and the survey is meant to describe the property those sites would sit on.
How a Park Ended Up With Two Landlords
The ownership history explains why the line stayed blurry. In 2022 the Town of Oyster Bay repaved the roadway and parking lot at Stillwell Field and added drainage and manholes to keep water off the road and out of the fields. At that time the town maintained and permitted the property, but Nassau County owned it. One government ran the ballfields on land another government held.
Earlier plans to transfer the property to the Syosset school district were rejected by voters, according to reports at the time. Then the Nassau County Legislature voted unanimously to transfer the park and preserve to the Town of Oyster Bay, with $12 million in upgrades attached. When the vote came, Legislator Arnold Drucker said the county had not yet approved the capital plan covering its share of that funding, so the financing details were still open. Sources in this research give different figures for the county's share, so none is stated here.
The approved transfer would put the property under a single owner. The survey is meant to describe what that owner holds, including where the athletic use stops and the preserve use starts. According to Ganz, nothing on the ground marks that line today.
Before You Go This Fall
A few habits fit a park in this state of flux.
- Check conditions after rain. The bike-designated routes are typically muddy after rain or snow.
- Reserve for the guided walk. The Long Island Greenbelt Trail Conference's Stillwell outing runs about two miles, is mostly flat with steep inclines near the water hole, and requires a reservation. The listing was current as of November 2025, so confirm the schedule before planning around it.
- Try the water hole stop. The guided route pauses there to explain its role in water recharge and wildlife.
- Ask the town for the survey's status. The Town of Oyster Bay is the source for whether it has been completed and filed.
If you own near the South Woods Road corridor and want a plain read on what changes in the neighborhood mean for your own property, you can request a free home valuation from Deepak Hemrajani and talk through it with the team.
