Woldumar would be my goal for a southwest extension. Maybe linking to Fine Park and Anderson Bike Park as well. I also agree that a northwest extension would be nice.
I highly recommend it. Very pretty. I've been running on it a few days a week and I love it. Still a few things to be finished up but it's ready to go. Barricades are gone, some signs are up, and some debris fences have been removed.
I haven't spent much time in the parks over the past five or ten years, I'm curious if anyone else here has any strong opinions on the condition of the parks?
I know that significant improvements haven't been made in a long while. Most tennis courts are in disrepair or abandoned and I don't think basketball courts fair much better, Moores Park pool is closed, the skating rinks are gone and no special landscaping is done even in most downtown parks. For positives, the parks do seem to be mowed and generally kept up, and there are consistently replaced playgrounds. I'd like to see all those negatives reversed, and further capital improvements made. I was looking at my property taxes and I don't see a parks millage, is there not one besides the county trail/zoo millages?
You live in the city? Parks are included in the general operating budget, which is just our general city millage (19 mills or so), I think. I'd argue that parks & rec is one of the service the city does fairly well, though there could definitely be improvements. But, yeah, I haven't noticed any considerable decline in services or quality.
Yeah, I have a house in Cherry Hill. I'd be supportive of a reasonably sized parks millage for capital improvements, I'd really like to see Moores Park pool fixed and the Washington Park ice rinks brought back. I'd like to see better landscaping and benches put in at the more formal downtown parks like Reutter, Durant and Wentworth. It'd be nice to have quality tennis and basketball courts in a reasonable number of parks and those that aren't going to be maintained should be removed. If finances allowed I'd love to see a handful of larger parks further developed/made more formal; Hunter, Washington and Adado Parks would be the first candidates to come to mind for something that (I'd add in Comstock, Gier, Bancroft, Cherry Hill, Davis, Moores and Francis parks to round out the top priorities).
I agree with all of that. Cities usually passively let basketball courts rot because they look at them as breeding crime; just a prejudiced thing we really need to get over. The one thing the city has done poorly in the parks beyond that is generally not maintaining sporting infrastructure with the one huge exception being soccer; the parks department is obsessed with soccer.
Another thing they put a lot of effort into are the community centers and programming at those to the detriment of a lot of other things. So, I guess it would be a good thing to get them "outside" the the community centers. I'll really have to go study plans for the parks on the city website to see what they have planned. We are getting A LOT of federal money, so we'll be seeing a lot of perks coming to different parts of the city over the coming year or two.
I remember the community centers being quite good when I was a kid, my parents had me in a few of the programs and I enjoyed them. I have heard from others as well that they still do a good job with those programs and I hope that continues.
I didn't know there was a parks plan, I'll have to get around to looking at that myself.
The parks I visit in Lansing are generally well kept, mostly the grass is mowed regularly, and litter removed. Of course, I have to say that back in the '60s when I grew up near Quentin and Frances Parks there were rock gardens with parental plantings, outdoor ice skating and snow sliding hills with lights so you could sled and skate until 9pm. In the summer there were summer "counselors" at most parks who would oversee activities like arts and crafts and games. In the fall there was Pewee and Jr. Spartan football. All of this and more took place outside in the fresh air. When I go for a walk at Quentin Park these days, I am always the only one there, I would like to see some kids playing and they might come outside if there were supervised activities for them to enjoy. There were once more formal gardens at Potter Park, that would be nice to see again, most parks had some sort of planted garden space. I have not been to many neighborhood parks, the only one I notice gets much use by young people is Moores Park. Lots of people at Frances Park because it is really nice, so I think improving the green spaces, encouraging people to come out to the parks and use them would lead to folks wanting improvements. Ingham County Parks seem to be a little better because the whole county supports them.
Comments
I haven't spent much time in the parks over the past five or ten years, I'm curious if anyone else here has any strong opinions on the condition of the parks?
I know that significant improvements haven't been made in a long while. Most tennis courts are in disrepair or abandoned and I don't think basketball courts fair much better, Moores Park pool is closed, the skating rinks are gone and no special landscaping is done even in most downtown parks. For positives, the parks do seem to be mowed and generally kept up, and there are consistently replaced playgrounds. I'd like to see all those negatives reversed, and further capital improvements made. I was looking at my property taxes and I don't see a parks millage, is there not one besides the county trail/zoo millages?
Another thing they put a lot of effort into are the community centers and programming at those to the detriment of a lot of other things. So, I guess it would be a good thing to get them "outside" the the community centers. I'll really have to go study plans for the parks on the city website to see what they have planned. We are getting A LOT of federal money, so we'll be seeing a lot of perks coming to different parts of the city over the coming year or two.
I didn't know there was a parks plan, I'll have to get around to looking at that myself.