Lincoln Park, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Lincoln Park, no two yards are alike.
A low spot, a south-facing slope, or a stand of trees moves the frost date and sun across a single Lincoln Park lot. Enter your address and we'll score 1,086 plants against your land's actual soil, sun, and frost.
We read public map data around Lincoln Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Lincoln Park — the short answer
Lincoln Park, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7a, about 219 days between hard freezes, across 201 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~219
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 201 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 28°F normals: light frosts run a few weeks past them, and tender transplants usually wait 2–3 weeks after the last hard freeze.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 7a is Lincoln Park's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lincoln Park's 219-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Lincoln Park
Each reading below is measured for Lincoln Park itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLincoln Park runs about 219 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredLincoln Park sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
The zone sets which perennials, shrubs, and fruit trees live through an average winter here — a plant rated for a colder zone is a safe bet, one rated warmer needs winter protection or gets treated as an annual.
Match perennials and fruit to the zone before you buy, so nothing you plant is a gamble against the cold.
USDA PHZM 2023
The kind of country Lincoln Park is in
Lincoln Park sits in the Ridge and Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Lincoln Park's own centroid rather than borrowed from Berks County.
What Grows in Lincoln Park
Every plant below cleared Lincoln Park's own zone 7a and its 219-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Lincoln Park?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 5; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 2 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 7 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Lincoln Park
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Lincoln Park, first recorded 2017. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Lincoln Park
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Lincoln Park. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- LINCOLN PARK ELEM SCHUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- WEIS GAS N GO 175Underground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- TURKEY HILL 13Underground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- VALERO FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- LINCOLN PARK SUNOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- LOWES OF SOUTH READING PA #1717Brownfields · 0.5 mi
- K MART 3136Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- GIANT FOOD STORE 6050Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- SPRINGTOWNE CLNR/SINKING SPRINGBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- THE HIGHLANDS AT WYOMISSINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- ALCON RESEARCH LLCBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- WAWA FOOD MKT 8010Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lincoln Park's center, not your beds. Run your own address for what's upwind of you specifically.
Environmental Intelligence
The counts behind that headline — every source type on the record near Lincoln Park.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Lincoln Park
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Lincoln Park
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lincoln Park, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 103 sites within ~10 miles of Lincoln Park. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Lincoln Park
Get exact proximity distances to contamination sources for your specific parcel — plus soil, sun, drainage, and 1,086 plant recommendations.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lincoln Park average
Your land is one point inside Lincoln Park
Everything above resolves to Lincoln Park as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 201 acres. Your parcel is one point inside that footprint. Slope, tree cover, a low spot that pools cold air, and what is in the soil are all resolved at the address, and none of them are visible at town scale. That is the honest boundary of this page, and the reason the next step is a reading of your own ground rather than a better local average.
Your Lot vs the Lincoln Park Average
Lincoln Park Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Lincoln Park
- ●One soil character for all of Lincoln Park
- ●Frost dates read at Lincoln Park's scale: Apr 2 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lincoln Park's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Lincoln Park
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lincoln Park, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lincoln Park averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lincoln Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lincoln Park average
How we know this about Lincoln Park
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Lincoln Park’s own record; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Soil is not read at town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-resolution survey in our data, which is why you will find no soil grid here rather than a statewide one wearing a local label. The resolution ledger below names every figure this page inherited.
Common questions about Lincoln Park
When does frost risk typically end in Lincoln Park?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lincoln Park typically lands around Apr 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — earlier than the light-frost dates most charts quote. That marks the hard freeze, not the last light frost — lighter frosts keep biting past it, which is why tender transplants here wait until about Apr 23.
When is the first frost in Lincoln Park?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Lincoln Park typically arrives around Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 24, so the watching starts about Oct 8 — about 219 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Lincoln Park?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lincoln Park sees about 219 frost-free days — roughly Apr 2 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 23 to Oct 24, about 184 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lincoln Park?
The federal record around Lincoln Park runs heavier than most — 1,542 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (843), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Lincoln Park?
From about Oct 8 the job here turns from planting to protecting — the last start even a 30-day crop can finish. As the season closes around the first 28°F hard freeze near Nov 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals), three moves buy time: row cover or an old sheet over tender plants on still, clear nights; water the soil the afternoon before a freeze, so it holds warmth overnight; and harvest tomatoes, peppers and basil before Nov 7. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Lincoln Park's scale — its 7a band and its 219-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lincoln Park's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
What this page reads at Lincoln Park’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Lincoln Park's own scale — its own ~219-day season between 28°F freezes, the 201 acres it covers and 1,542 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lincoln Park's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lincoln Park's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 2 and Nov 7 and the ~219-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,542 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Lincoln Park, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Lincoln Park's boundary and the 201 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~219-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Lincoln Park's own centroid, the Ridge and ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Lincoln Parklydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Lincoln Park's 201 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Berks County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Berks County
- The growing challenges every Pennsylvania grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Pennsylvania
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Berks County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Lincoln Park's 201 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Lincoln Park you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 201 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out, measured from the town centrehow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — measured at your address, and averaged away by any Lincoln Park-wide figureread your own land →
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