Is it Limekiln Lake or Lake Hill 'N Brook?
Can the public access the lake?
What's the story behind the neighborhood?
This little lake on Kalamazoo's southwest side answers to two names — Lake Hill 'N Brook to the neighborhoods around it, Limekiln Lake (Google renders it 'Lake Lime Kiln') on the map — and sits where the Hill N Brook and Parkview Hills neighborhoods meet, among the rolling wooded hills that give the area its seclusion four miles from downtown. West Fork Portage Creek threads right past it, part of the brook in Hill N Brook's name.
The lake's real story is the neighborhood around it: Parkview Hills was one of Michigan's early planned environmental communities, conceived when conservationist H. Lewis Batts Jr. and businessman Burton H. Upjohn purchased 288 acres of streams, lakes, and forest and designed a development meant to blend into them — preserving more than 100 acres of open space. The lake is a centerpiece of that vision: a walking trail runs beside it, and Parkview Hills residents keep a small beach park on its shore for kayaking and paddling. A handful of Hill N Brook homes carry lake access as their premium.
The honest part for everyone else: this is a private lake with no public access — the beach park, the water, and the fishing belong to the surrounding residents and their guests. There's no ramp, no public frontage, and no legal way onto the water without an invitation. The good news is that Kalamazoo's public alternatives are close: Woods Lake, a couple miles northeast, has the city's Woods Lake Park and beach open to the public in season, and the 274-acre Asylum Lake Preserve — trails, water views, and one of the city's best natural areas — is minutes away. This page exists so the map makes sense; the lake itself asks to be admired from the trail.