John S. Taylor Park Non-Motorized Boat Ramp

ALLIGATORS, AND A DOCUMENTED FATALITY. On May 31, 2022 a 47-year-old man was found dead in Taylor Lake with alligator-related injuries; the Tampa Bay Times identified him the next day as Sean McGuinness and reported that police believed he was searching for flying discs in the lake, and that two alligators were captured and killed. Largo police noted that signs are posted at the lake instructing people not to swim, and FWC urged people not to swim in or walk near it. No report says the ramp or park closed as a result. Keep dogs out of the water, do not wade after a disc, and launch from the ramp rather than the bank.

NON-MOTORIZED — AND THE COUNTY'S TWO LABELS DO NOT MATCH. The park page says "Boat Ramp (Non-Motorized)" and FWC names the facility the same way, but the county's ramp roster describes a "Small Ramp for Boats without Gas Motors – No Permit Required," which bans gasoline rather than all motors. No published rule resolves them — the county code chapter that would settle it, Chapter 90, is not readable online in plain text. Gas outboards are out. For an electric trolling motor, call Parks at (727) 464-3000 before towing.

OPEN PER AGENCY PAGES, NOT FIELD-CHECKED. As of 31 July 2026 the county's park page lists the ramp as a current amenity with no closure alert, the county's temporary-facility-closures list does not name John S. Taylor Park, and FWC's row reads open with no field notes. No dated photo or inspection confirms ramp, parking or restroom condition since the seawall work ended in fall 2024.

WET-SEASON DRAWDOWN — EXPECT LOWER WATER ROUGHLY MAY THROUGH OCTOBER. The county's 2014 McKay Creek report documents a 24-inch valve at the Taylor Lake control structure, manually operated from the end of April to the beginning of November, with the goal of holding the lake two to three feet below the weir outfall through the rainy season. That is the 2014 procedure; no later county document confirms or updates it.

THE 2023–24 SEAWALL AND WEIR WORK IS FINISHED, BUT OLDER PHOTOS ARE NOT OF THIS LAKE. Pinellas County's Taylor Lake Seawall Improvements project covered "replacement of the existing vinyl sheet pile wall along the north end of Taylor Lake, drainage improvements along 8th Avenue SW, and repair of the existing pedestrian bridge," and the county states that "The water elevation of the lake needed to be lowered for the contractor to replace the existing sheet pile wall and repair the existing weir structure." Design was complete December 2022, construction ran September 2023 to Fall 2024, and the page now reads "Construction: Completed." Any photo, depth impression or trip report from that window shows an artificially drawn-down lake.

Craft Access

✗

Motorboat

✓

Kayak / Canoe

✗

Jet Ski / PWC

✗

Large 22ft+

Site Details

Conditions change rapidly due to water levels, prop wash, and weather. Always visually inspect before backing down.

RampConcrete; FWC rates condition "Good to Excellent", 1 lane

Water DepthNot established. The Tampa Bay Water Atlas page for Taylor Lake prints "No Data Available" for mean depth, maximum depth and volume, and lists 0 hydrologic sampling locations. No depth figure appears in county or NHD sources either.

DockNo docks. FWC's row records DockType "No Docks," and the county's park map legend shows none. · ADA

Trailer Parking7 spots · mix of paved and unpaved (fwc), condition "good"

Vehicle-Only47 spots

Crowding No visitation figures are published. FWC's 47 vehicle and 7 trailer spaces serve a 156.5-acre park with a disc golf course, a ball field, seven grill shelters, a 2024 playground and a Pinellas Trail connection, so on a weekend most of the lot is not boaters. The no-gas-motor rule keeps powerboats away.

Plan B — if this lot is full Pinellas County's boat-ramp-parking page lists five freshwater ramps: A.L. Anderson Park (Tarpon Springs), John S. Taylor Park, John Chesnut Sr. Park (Palm Harbor), Lake Seminole Park (Seminole) and Walsingham Park (Largo). Walsingham Park is the closest match in kind — it is the only other one carrying the line "Small Ramp for Boats without Gas Motors – No Permit Required," and it sits one link upstream on the same creek. Unlike Taylor Lake, Walsingham Park Lake is a 100-acre FWC Fish Management Area with published bag limits. The other three take gas motors.

FeeNo fee — no permit required

Hours7 a.m. to sunset, seven days a week

SeasonOpen year-round, except two county park closure days

AccessibilityFWC codes this site "Low Level of Accessibility" while the same row records two accessible vehicle spaces and an accessible flush restroom; parking is a mix of paved and unpaved. The county's park map legend marks the park "Wheelchair Accessible," but that is park-wide and no county source describes the launch itself. We do not claim the ramp is accessible. Call Parks at (727) 464-3000.

Not Available Fish cleaning · Fishing pier · Pier

Scout's Notes

Ramp Quirks & Etiquette

Find The Ramp

1100 8th Avenue SW, Largo — the address on every county record — with the ramp at 27.90404, -82.80364. Park phone (727) 582-2100; Pinellas County Parks (727) 464-3000. Open 7 a.m. to sunset, closed the day after Thanksgiving and December 25.

No Gas, Electric Unclear

The county's two labels don't match: the park page says "Non-Motorized" while the ramp roster says "Boats without Gas Motors." Gas outboards are out either way; whether a small electric trolling motor is legal is unresolved in any published rule. Call (727) 464-3000 before you tow.

Free, No Permit

No fee and no permit here, while the county's pay-station ramps run $6 a day and the annual Boat & Beach Pass costs $117.70 with tax. Taylor and Walsingham are the only two county freshwater ramps on the free side of that line.

Small Trailerables Fit

FWC records one concrete lane and seven trailer spaces — the signature of a launch that can take a trailered dinghy, rowing shell or paddled jon boat, not just carry-down kayaks. Those are old inventory figures, though, and no county source describes the launch geometry, so hold the plan loosely.

Arrive Early Saturdays

The lot serves the whole park — disc golf, a ball field, seven grill shelters, a playground and a Pinellas Trail connection — and no spaces are reserved for ramp users. On a weekend most of the asphalt is not boaters; come early for a spot near the water.

One Pool Only

The launch puts you on a single 53-acre pool. The inlet and outlet are channelized ditch reaches and the outlet is a county-operated weir, so there is no boat route out in either direction — what you launch onto is the whole trip.

FWC Florida Boat Ramp Inventory row PI101020XM (layer 4), re-queried live 2026-07-31, plus Pinellas County Parks & Conservation Resources' John S. Taylor Park page, Park Rules page, boat-ramp-parking page, parks index and park map PDF, the county's Taylor Lake Seawall Improvements project page, the Pinellas County / SWFWMD McKay Creek Watershed Evaluation and BMP Report (June 2014), and May–June 2022 reporting from the Tampa Bay Times, WTSP and FOX 13 Tampa Bay — all fetched or re-fetched 2026-07-31.

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