By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Bowling Green’s parks and facilities need a healthy dose of TLC. So that’s the focus of the five-year master plan that was approved last week by the city planning commission.
During the last couple decades, the parks and recreation department was busy adding acreage and building facilities. This next five years will be much less sexy – but very necessary, said Kristin Otley, director of the parks and recreation department.
“We need to take care of what we have,” Otley said to the planning commission. “We have been growing, growing, growing for 16 years.”
Some of the biggest maintenance needs are in one of the oldest parks – City Park.
“We need to give it the TLC (tender loving care) it deserves,” Otley said. And that means “a lot of roofs.”
The largest building in City Park – Veterans Building – has reached a crossroads. “It has to be addressed,” she said. “Do we tear down and build, or renovate?”
The city’s public works department took care of one issue at City Park last year by repairing the aging stone wall originally build by the Works Progress Administration, which was part of the nation’s New Deal program in 1935 to 1943.
Each park in the city has its own needs, including some that need to be made ADA compliant, and some that need LED lighting and other energy conservation changes. The newest, Ridge Park, needs the back area leveled and reseeded. Carter Park is in line to get a new playground area and a couple shelter houses replaced.
All the gardens have been created in Simpson Garden Park and the parking lot was recently repaved after being put off for a few years, but another bay is needed for equipment. Wintergarden Park got new public restrooms and a maintenance building last year, and this year the nature center will be renovated.
Efforts are being made to complete trails leading to the community center on the north edge of the city on Newton Road. And the community center, which is now 10 years old, is in need of standard maintenance.
The city pool is in line to get three “creatures” added to its splash pad for the smallest swimmers. And a speed slide is somewhere in the pool’s future, Otley said. “We have the best water park in the region,” she added.
The parks and recreation department is also continuing to work on its programming, adding classes for mature adults, an outdoor obstacle course, days-off-school programs, family fitness classes, walking clubs, birthday party offerings, archery and outdoor adventure programs.
The mission of the parks is to “enhance quality of life through parks, programs and facilities.” The five-year plan focuses on that mission in a much more realistic manner than the previous 10-year plans, Otley said.
