Improvements to the Brown Bridge Quiet Area, new seating for the Open Space, a potential new parking plan for Greilickville Harbor Park and efforts to raise funds for a new Civic Center playground are just a few of the parks projects now underway in the Grand Traverse region.

Brown Bridge Quiet Area
Recent paddlers down the Boardman River may have noticed something different in the quarter-mile stretch above the Brown Bridge Dam removal area: large excavators. The machinery is on-hand as part of a new project to reconnect the river to its floodplain following the 2012 dewatering incident at the dam.

“We’re excavating the banks down to a level where the river can access the floodplain, and then planting vegetation along the bank to increase its stability,” explains Frank Dituri, chairman of the implantation team for the Boardman River Dams & Restoration Project. The river is incised right now for a 1,200 foot-long stretch, meaning the banks are so high the river can’t naturally distribute water to the floodplain during a high rain event. Instead, the river bounces back and forth between banks, eroding them and moving sediment downstream.

Dituri says the floodplain reconnection project should be finished in the next week or two. “The Grand Traverse Conservation District will then be planting the bare soils with local seeds and live willow plantings, so within a year or two you will not be able to tell anything was even done there,” he says. “The river will be functioning much better than it is now.”

Just downstream from that project, GTCD sent volunteers out Friday to temporarily relocate native plants into containers ahead of construction next week to create a shallow wetland area. Thanks to a U.S. Fish and Wildlife grant, GTCD is installing a control structure on a culvert that will back up the river water in the spring and fall, creating a shallow water habitat for a variety of wildlife. Plants that might be disturbed by construction were carefully removed yesterday, and will be replanted once the project is complete.

The Brown Bridge Quiet Area is also slated to see the installation of a new footbridge this fall in the east end of the park near the outlet of Grasshopper Creek. Steve Largent of GTCD says the abutments for the bridge have now been installed, and the organization is coordinating with the National Guard on timing to fly the actual bridge structure over from its current resting place at Ranch Rudolph to the park. The bridge should be completed and open to the public “by the end of October,” Largent says.

Open Space Seating
A new crowdfunding campaign led by Traverse City Planning Commissioner Linda Koebert aims to raise dollars to install new seating in the Open Space downtown.

The campaign seeks to purchase high-quality Adirondack chairs similar to those at Clinch Park to be installed at the Open Space. Koebert notes Clinch Park’s chairs “are in constant use for sunset viewing, people watching, or book reading” and says “a few more chairs would make a great addition to other parts of the bayfront.”

Each chair costs $625 and is “durable and heavy enough not to be stolen,” says Koebert. Over a dozen donations have already contributed $840 to the campaign’s $5,000 goal, with donors able to purchase a chair with a dedication plaque for the full $625 or else contribute a smaller amount to an unnamed chair. City Commissioner Gary Howe has also asked both the city commission and parks and recreation commission to discuss providing matching funds for any campaign dollars raised at their upcoming meetings.

Elmwood Township Parking
Elmwood Township Supervisor Jack Kelly plans to ask township parks and recreation committee members to consider implementing a parking fee structure at Greilickville Harbor Park and the Brewery Creek Center property similar to a recently enacted fee at Empire Beach.

“As proposed, a modest hourly parking fee would be charged for use (of the parks), with township residents likely exempt from paying via a parking pass,” according to Kelly. “GHP is a million-dollar facility…(that’s) going to start costing Elmwood Township money to repair and maintain. Thus, why not charge a modest parking fee like everyone else, and use such ‘user fee’ funds to help offset future repair and maintenance costs and to perhaps pay to hire a park attendant or two?”

Kelly says he plans to bring the proposal up for parks and recreation consideration in either September or October.

GT County Civic Center
Grand Traverse County Parks & Recreation is hoping to raise $50,000 by midnight Wednesday for a new playground at the Civic Center.

A crowdfunding campaign for the structure has netted $6,261 to date through 53 donors. If the campaign hits $50,000 by the Wednesday deadline, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation and Michigan State Housing Development Authority will provide a $50,000 match, effectively funding the playground construction. While the county has considerable fundraising ground to cover in its five remaining days, Parks & Recreation Director Kristine Erickson notes playground naming rights are potentially on the table “for donations that nearly or completely close the $44,000 gap.”

Should the campaign fall short of its $50,000 goal, collected donations will still be put toward the project, and the county “will continue to raise funds until the overall goal of $100,000 is reached, no matter how long it takes,” says Erickson.

Pictured: Brown Bridge Quiet Area. Photo credit: Grand Traverse Conservation District.