About a month and half ago, early on a Saturday morning, I attended the public meeting to specifically discuss Brook Run Park and compared to many recent community meetings, this one was quite tame. There were about 45 residents in attendance who by my rough estimation had an average age of about 55 years old and they threw out ideas as to what they desired as to the future of Brook Run Park. Besides a group of neighbors who live immediately adjacent to the dog park, I didn't notice any large contingent of special interest groups who attended the meeting en-mass. That being said, the residents who attended voiced their special concerns or favorite park ideas, what ever they may be and each one was valued and recorded.
The consultant may have bounced a few ideas off the group in attendance and some were added as possible ideas that in the end, may or may not stick. Some of the ideas broached concerned the movement of the baseball fields from Dunwoody Park to Brook Run to make for a larger Dunwoody Nature Center, possible relocation of the Dunwoody Community Garden as well as the Dog Park to sites that some may believe would be better suited.
This evening (Thursday) there will be a another parks meeting at City Hall starting at 6 pm on the Citywide Parks and Greenspace Master Plan and though I am expecting a few more targeted groups in attendance over the first meeting; my hope is that the room will be filled with a representative cross section of the community. This meeting will focus on long-range guidance to the City of Dunwoody on park redevelopment, possible land acquisitions for future park space, staffing options, operations management, revenue sources and maintenance plans. The long term master plan will include a Citywide green space and parks needs assessment to evaluate current level of service, study potential and appropriate acquisition needs, and identify existing private and public recreation opportunities.
Per the meeting announcements, only after the Citywide plan is completed will the update to the Brook Run Master Plan be completed. Long Story, short; if you are interested in the future of Dunwoody parks and the services being provided, please attend this meeting. We need to hear from you. Thanks.
Thursday, January 27th
Dunwoody City Hall
41 Perimeter Center East
Dunwoody, GA 30346
6:00 p.m.
3 comments:
After Dunwoody took over, the parks have never looked so bad. The addition of 5 new green benches at the kids play ground, is that the only money that has been spent? And they are installed poorly and will sink into the ground making them very short by summer time. (just like the swings)
When the contractors come to blow off the parks they only do half the park, come back 2 weeks latter and do the other half. Is this what what we are paying for? 1/2
The Security guard is gone from Brook Run. The Dekalb government though the expensive was justified but Dunwoody doesn't. I guess security it's needed in a *SMART city like Dunwoody.
Lets secure the building at Brook Run. Some of the building were usable until Dunwoody took over and the vandals returned after the security guard was removed.
Dunwoody signed a contract to get one of the death traps torn down. I hope this project is completed this year.
Please don't have Dunwoody start another project until they complete some of the ones from last year, like PAVING DUNWOODY CLUB.
John--
If the previous poster is correct about park maintenance @ Brook Run, maybe it would be to our advantage to look at ensuring top level maintenance as part of the planning going forward.
Sure, at these planning meetings you get all kinds of sky-high ideas that may or may not be feasible to even construct. But once you get it, how will you maintain it? Long term maintenance has to be part and parcel of any discussion about park facilities. If you don't have the resources to maintain it, you can't afford to build it. Period.
Regarding your specifics:
IMHO (all of these are MHO....) the idea of moving the ballparks got me thinking about the smaller parks in town (smaller than Brook Run anyway) None of these small parks is going to be large enough to be "everything, all the time". Using Dunwoody Park as a passive area that dovetails with the DNC would make the best use of the place (and Brook Run, or perhaps another park would provide better parking for ball games.)
Along those lines, have one small park for picnicking or "passive use", one for dogs, one for organized sports, etc. Brook Run is large enough to handle all of these if you guys plan ahead.
If you're going to ask the Garden to move, you'd better have one helluva positive incentive - they invested a lot of effort there and they'll have to do it all. over. again. if they move. Plus, access to water is going to be a key factor.
Speaking of water I know there are folks who like water-based features, whether a community pool, or decorative fountain, or similar things. I think any discussion of more park features that use additional water should be tabled until the fed lawsuit by AL and FL over GA's water rights to Lake Lanier are settled. You don't want to invest in that kind of infrastructure and get stuck with limited water use if that lawsuit doesn't go our way.
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