By MELINDA J. OVERSTREET
for Glasgow News 1
The design for a revamped American Legion Park is making progress, with an eye toward having at least some of the bid specifications ready by January. And across town, bleachers are going to be ordered for Richardson Stadium and, it is anticipated that the rest of the construction will be advertised for bids in about two weeks.
Pat Hoagland, vice president of Brandstetter Carroll, was back with the Glasgow Common Council Parks and Recreation Committee (formally the Planning and Development Committee) at its regular meeting Monday with an update. He brought with him a proposed conceptual plan for the buildings that would accompany the aquatic center that’s planned for the top of the hill in the area where the baseball field is now.
One of the buildings would contain storage spaces for deck equipment, chemicals, etc., a room for the filtration system and other mechanical-type functions, plus the bathrooms for those using the aquatic center. Across a covered breezeway would be the ticket window with the office behind it, along with spaces for the life guards, concessions/food storage, another smaller mechanical room, a meeting room and the day-camp room – with both of the last two spaces separately accessible, as they could be rented out by community members when not in use for other purposes – and, of course, bathrooms, including a separate one for staff members. This day-camp space would have a couple of garage doors to create an open-air space, and it would replace the building at the park used for camp now, as the old one would be demolished to make way for other park features, like basketball courts. A considerable amount of roof overhang would be provided almost all the way around both sides of the combined structure to provide shaded areas.
Discussion initiated by Councilwoman Chasity Lowery, who chairs the committee, included whether restrooms at the top of the hill would be available for those not going to the aquatic center, because otherwise they’d have to go all the way to the bottom of the hill, and the possibility of coupling a couple of them with a small shelter. It was revisited again later, but no definite decision was reached on that.
Hoagland asked Eddie Furlong, director of the Parks and Recreation Department, whether his design provided all the spaces he needed.
“It does, and just a little bit more,” Furlong said, “so I’m pretty happy with the layout the way it is.”
After a few minutes more of discussion on those points, Hoagland said, “What we haven’t talked about is the look. Is there a theme or certain materials that you think would be appropriate for Glasgow?”
Councilman Patrick Gaunce asked him what types of materials, in his experience, works the best, and Hoagland said masonry is best.
“We’d like not to do concrete-block buildings, because they don’t look very good,” he said. “But brick holds up really well over a long period of time.”
“We just need this pool to last as long as the last one did, so about 47 years, whatever you need to build it with,” Lowery said, referring to the one at the bottom of the hill along Happy Valley Road (Ky. 90).
Hoagland said colorful metal roofs work well with those, and he asked about the color scheme, and Lowery and Gaunce told him about the city’s new logo and indicated they would prefer something that could complement it.
“At some point,” Furlong said, “I would like to name this facility. … I think there’s a person who deserves a name attached to this building.”
He suggested Joyce Driver, who had worked at the pool practically from the time it opened until about two years ago when her health led her to retire. Furlong said that whether it’s the whole facility or just part of it, he thought her name should be somewhere there.
“I can’t think of a finer lady to be honored,” said Lowery.
“That’s a good thought, Eddie,” Gaunce said.
Sponsorship opportunities would also be available, multiple individuals suggested.
“Well, now that we’ve got sort of a floor plan that we agree on, we’ll come up with some elevations and some color schemes … and bring those to you to look at and see what you think there.”
Based on discussions and requests at past meetings, Hoagland had also prepared a conceptual design with Pin Oak Lane extending back and joining the park at its southwest corner and adding eight tennis courts, lighting, parking and bathrooms in an adjacent area to that drive and near the Barren County Family YMCA. Due primarily to elevation changes but also other factors, Hoagland estimated that the cost for developing that would be almost $7 million, not including property acquisition, which seemed to quickly halt the tennis-courts idea – and possibly the road extension, too, for anytime in the near future among those present.
Councilman Terry Bunnell, a committee member who champions tennis, was absent for this meeting.
The roadway extension itself would be about $1.2 million, Hoagland said, but that also didn’t include property acquisition and upgrading the rest of Pin Oak, currently a dead end with one insurance business and the Glasgow Police Department along it, to handle the increased traffic.
Lowery also noted that the city may not need to construct eight tennis courts now, because Glasgow Independent Schools just purchased about 10 acres behind its middle school and tennis courts are one of the possible plans for it. That land is relatively level.
Gaunce said at least one other party may be developing tennis courts soon as well.
Hoagland said if they built the same courts design elsewhere on flatter land with existing accessibility, it would be about $2.6 million.
“I say we go in a different direction, Pat …,” Gaunce said. “We just can’t. We don’t have the money for that.”
Then the discussion turned to the current drive into the park from Happy Valley and other traffic changes.
Richardson Stadium
As it is now, the current entrance would remain and leaving the park would become a right-turn only.
Eventually, the topic of Richardson Stadium’s resurrection arose. Furlong said that he and Jim McGowan, superintendent of the Glasgow Department of Public Works, said he have spoken with the architect who is working to finalize bid documents.
McGowan said they were hoping to have the bid package out by now. The design is finished, but the architect is still working on the bid documents. Furlong said they’re thinking they can start the advertisement in two weeks.
Furlong’s reached out to the bleacher company representative, and as of two weeks ago, if they’d ordered by Nov. 1, they could guarantee the city would have them by March 1, and they’re still on pretty much on that time frame, but they haven’t ordered them because they were going to make that part of the bid process.
Mayor Henry Royse said he and McGowan have discussed just going ahead and buying them and storing them temporarily, and then at least they could know they would have them in time for baseball season, when Glasgow High School would be using the baseball diamond.
McGowan asked Furlong what he thought about getting the bleachers installed to have at least that much ready as the building between them for ticket and concession sales, the press box, etc. is constructed. Furlong said that if they could get the footer pad done, “we can move our other bleachers, if we had to, to just give them something until the construction starts.” They wouldn’t hold as many people.
The mayor said they need to at least have the goal of having the new bleachers installed by the time the season started. He said they have their price, and any of the contractors they would hire would use the same bleachers anyway, so there was no point in letting a contractor add to the price and then have to sweat whether they would arrive in time.
“We’ve got a place to keep them until they get that pad built over there,” Royse said.
McGowan said there would be no guarantee the bleachers could arrive in time if they wait, with bid advertisement still being a couple of weeks away and then allowing two to three more weeks for responses to it. After further discussion, which included a question or two from Councilman Freddie Norris, it was decided by consensus they would go ahead and put the order in and have it in the bid package that the city would be providing the actual bleachers.
“I see no reason to sit on it,” Royse said.
Comments