WALNUT CREEK, CA — The pock, pock, pock has been rattling the houses along Dapplegray Lane for four years now. And nobody is anywhere close to making it stop.
Here is the short version.
Two tennis courts at Rudgear Park turned into eight pickleball courts a few years back. The neighbors who live beside them were not asked first, and they have not let it go since.
Now the city is in court over a noise fight that has outlasted two councils and most of the national pickleball boom. A judge will decide whether Walnut Creek built a nuisance. Or whether people who bought homes next to a public park should have seen this coming.
How eight courts became a lawsuit
The amended complaint, dated May 1, 2025, lays out the neighbors’ case in hard numbers. Their homes sit 50 to 90 feet from the nearest courts. They put the noise as high as 88 decibels, roughly a leaf blower at close range.
They want fewer courts. Quieter equipment. Soundproofing. Limits on how many people play, and when. Or the whole thing gone.
The city owns the courts, built them, and lets anyone play for free during posted hours. That last part is where the trouble lives.
A neighbor on Dapplegray Lane asked Patch not to print her name. She said the noise can run 14 hours a day on a summer weekend. She bought her home in 1979 partly because she could walk to the tennis courts. Now she cannot watch television in her family room, open a window, or eat on her deck.
“They’re having fun,” she said of the players, “and they go home to a quiet home.”
What both sides actually say
Players see it differently, and they have a point. One resident told the city council, “It’s not a quiet meadow. It’s a community park.” Club members argue the courts run inside legal noise limits, and that a park comes with park sounds.
“I love playing pickleball myself. Hopefully we can find a solution that all parties are happy with.”
Mayor Kevin Wilk, in 2022
Fair enough, up to a point. The research says pickleball noise is not loud so much as relentless. A sharp, impulsive pop, thousands of times a day, all in the same rhythm. One acoustics paper calls it “scientifically annoying,” the audio version of a dripping faucet or a truck backing up.
Players say the sport peaks around 70 decibels. Neighbors say 88. Both can be true on different days, and neither number settles the argument. The annoyance is in the pattern, not the volume.
Other cities have gone further. Martinez, Danville, Brentwood, and Alameda have all shut pickleball facilities at some point, the neighbors note in their complaint. Carmel’s council made play in its only public park a misdemeanor. Walnut Creek, so far, has chosen to negotiate instead.
The city has already given ground
Walnut Creek has not been idle. It cut playing hours by 20 percent. It closed the courts for two afternoons. It locks them outside posted hours.
It also asked players to park on the court side of the street instead of in front of homes. Neighbors had complained that cars blocked driveways and views, and that some players moved trash cans and ignored fire hydrants.
City spokeswoman Elizabeth Orcutt said the litigation prevents the city from commenting on the case or explaining why other fixes never advanced.
Mayor Kevin Wilk saw it coming. In 2022 he wrote that the courts get “loud all day,” and that the impact had become “unsustainable at this location.” He plays the game himself. Four years on, everyone is still waiting for the solution.
| The site | Rudgear Park, next to homes on Dapplegray Lane |
| The change | Two tennis courts converted to eight pickleball courts |
| The gap | Homes 50 to 90 feet from the nearest court |
| The claim | Noise up to 88 decibels, per the neighbors’ amended complaint (May 1, 2025) |
| The ask | Fewer courts, quieter gear, soundproofing, or removal |
| The status | Ongoing litigation; the city says it cannot comment |
The fix nobody wants to pay for
Back in December 2022, the Parks, Recreation and Open Space Commission set up a task force to find pickleball a new home. That search is now in its fourth year.
The complaint points to the Stewart Avenue tennis courts, a tenth of a mile away. A city sound study warned that converting those would break noise guidelines, so the city dropped the idea. The complaint notes that Rudgear kept running anyway.
There is a new facility coming, just not for the public. The Rossmoor Pickleball Court project at 1021 Stanley Dollar Drive is under construction. The Planning Commission approved it on March 27, 2025. It is a Golden Rain Foundation project, and the city says it will not add public courts.
| Dec. 2022 | Parks commission creates a pickleball task force to find a new location |
| 2022 | City report calls the Rudgear impact “unsustainable at this location” |
| May 1, 2025 | Neighbors file an amended complaint against the city |
| Mar. 27, 2025 | Planning Commission approves the Rossmoor facility (not public) |
| Today | Games continue at Rudgear Park while the case moves forward |
Forty-two neighbors signed a petition before any of this reached a courtroom. That is a small number in a city of 70,000, and a very loud one if you are the house behind the backboard.
What happens next
Nothing fast. The lawsuit is pending, and there is no trial date on the calendar. The city has asked a judge to toss the case on the grounds that governments are immune when they run their own parks.
Meanwhile, the courts are open. The schedule is posted. And if you drive down Dapplegray Lane on a warm Saturday, you will hear exactly what four years of litigation sounds like.
Pock. Pock. Pock.
This is not the first time Walnut Creek has wrestled with how a public amenity lands on the people closest to it. It is the same question that ran through the city’s below-market housing lottery and the last round at Putter’s over on Locust. Who gets to use the land, and who has to live beside it.
Have a take, or a quieter paddle? I’m listening. Know something I should cover? Reply or DM.
