Photo: Hot Furnace · CC BY-SA 4.010% of Ball’s land is conserved: 511 acres
8 acres are parks and preserves, 2.2 per 1,000 residents. 34% of residents live within a half mile of a park. 3.0 miles of mapped trail cross Ball, 0.4 per square mile of land.
Ahead of 41% of U.S. towns · #40 of 162 in Louisiana. What drives it
What kind of outdoors town is Ball?
Read from the map. The page puts what stands out first.
How much outdoors does Ball have?
On conserved land, trails, park land and how close residents live to a park, Ball is ahead of 41% of U.S. towns, #40 of 162 in Louisiana. Conserved land holds the grade up; park acres per resident pull it down.
Few Louisiana towns conserve much land (a typical one, 1%; the U.S., 4%), so Ball’s 10% is ahead of 96% of Louisiana towns, while its trails per square mile lead 77% of them.
PAD-US, OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors), Census 2025 Gazetteer and 2020 blocks; details in Sources below. How TownRatings grades the outdoors →
Conserved land, trails & bike routes
Tap a number to zoom to a park. Tap a layer to hide it.
511 conserved acres
10% of Ball’s land. Who manages Ball’s conserved land, from the USGS Protected Areas Database. Approximate, because parcels can overlap.
| Parcel (PAD-US) | Managed by | Acres | Public access |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kisatchie National Forest National Forest | U.S. Forest Service | 504 | Open |
| Ward 10 Recreation District Local Recreation Area | Regional agency | 5 | Open |
| Walking Trail Park Local Park | Town or city | 2 | Open |
1 named trail
The best walking months in Ball: April and May
NOAA’s 1991–2020 normals for the town and the daylight at its latitude. Outlined months have long days, highs of 59 to 86 °F and little rain for the place.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daylight (h) | 10.3 | 11.0 | 11.9 | 12.9 | 13.7 | 14.2 | 14.0 | 13.3 | 12.3 | 11.3 | 10.5 | 10.1 |
| High (°F) | 60 | 64 | 71 | 78 | 85 | 90 | 92 | 93 | 88 | 80 | 69 | 61 |
| Rain (in) | 6.0 | 5.1 | 5.2 | 5.2 | 4.6 | 4.9 | 4.5 | 4.1 | 4.1 | 4.7 | 5.2 | 5.8 |
August is the driest month (4.1 in) and the warmest (highs of 93 °F). 6.0 inches fall in January, the wettest month. Summer highs reach 93 °F, too hot for the outline. The climate in Ball →
Ball and its neighbors
Ball has the most mapped trails of the 2 towns around it. Tap a town to see its outdoors.
| Town | Conserved of land | Trail mi per sq mi | Park acres per 1,000 | Near a park ½ mile | Outdoors |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ball | 10% | 0.4 | 2 | 34% | C+ |
| Pineville | under 1% | 0.1 | 4 | 25% | D |
The four inputs of the Outdoors grade, from the engine; shares are of land, not water.
Questions about parks and trails in Ball
How much of Ball is conserved land?
10% of its land, against a typical 1% for a Louisiana town and 4% nationally (PAD-US). Conserved doesn’t always mean open to visitors: easements are usually private land.
Is there public land near Ball?
41,527 acres of parks and open public land lie inside Ball or within 10 miles of it (PAD-US), 515 of them inside the town line.
How much outdoors does Ball have?
Ahead of 41% of U.S. towns on the Outdoors grade, #40 of 162 in Louisiana. The grade combines the share of land that is conserved, miles of mapped trail per square mile of land, park acres per 1,000 residents and the share of residents within a half mile of a park. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
Trail talk
Conditions, parking and favorite walks from Ball neighbors.
Where this page comes from
Conserved and public land: USGS Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US), service updated July 2026. Parks, trails, playgrounds, beaches and other places: OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL), map data as of 2026-10-28. Land and water area: Census 2025 Gazetteer. Residents near a park: 2020 Census blocks. National Register: National Park Service. How TownRatings grades the outdoors →