Dogs will soon have a place of their own to enjoy in Pavas and Sabana Sur in San Jose where two dog parks will be situated.

The Bella Vista Park in Pavas and Nacionalidad Costarricense in Sabana Sur will continue open for the general public but part of their area will be transformed into a dog park, featuring ramps, mazes, socialization areas and recreational areas specially designed for our four legged friends.

The park in Sabana Sur will destine an area of 1500 square meters out of the total area of 26.743 for this purpose while the Bella Vista park will use 400 square meters for this project.
The first stage of the project involves the installation of a security fence to separate the area of the dog parks and also with the objective of keeping the dogs safe and avoid them running to the street.

In the second phase, special ramps, runways and tunnels will be added for recreational purposes, also containers to properly dispose of dog poop and of course benches for the owners to rest and socialize.

The initial investment for this project is of 2.8 million colones (over $5,000 USD) in Sabana Sur and 1.5 million colones (under $3,000 USD) in Pavas.

The initiative came from a group of neighbors who approached the San Jose Municipality looking for support, since they saw the need of having an adequate and safe place for to take their pets for recreational purposes. The dog owners have also been involved in the design process of the canine parks taking as reference dog parks in Europe and the United States.

“This is a neighborhood were between 75% – 80% of the homes have a dog. We saw each other every morning when we took them out for walks and we started bonding. In fact, now we plan activities together”, said Luis Ortiz, neighbor of Pavas.

This is not a new initiative in Costa Rica, Curridabat at the east of San Jose, started pushing this projects eight years ago and this is currently the county with more dog parks in the country, featuring 7 total parks.

Desamparados also has its own canine park of 1200 square meters.