A dog park, batting cages and a police substation will be added to Maple Park sometime in the near future.
Maybe.
Those were some of the ideas contributed at the second community meeting to design a master plan for Maple Park.
Planner/landscaper John Mac Manus of Altamanu, Inc. facilitated the meeting, presenting several hypothetical plans showing how the park could look one day, based on suggestions from the first meeting, held last month.
More than 50 people attended Monday at Carroll Center with residents voicing different ideas for how the park can improve.
“To have so many people here to give us feedback on the front end of the planning efforts, I can’t tell you how much that means to all of us,” said Gary Balling, Park District of Oak Park executive director.
Almost every suggestion had at least one opponent, but talks remained civil.
One issue splitting the crowd was the idea of adding a dog park at Maple. Some residents prefer a property on West Garfield near the south branch post office for a dog park, but Mac Manus said that land is privately owned and was not for sale as of a year ago.
Neighbors worry a dog park might cause numerous problems, including owners not cleaning up droppings, aggressive breeds attacking children, and overcrowding.
Some dog park advocates like Mike Farley, former president of Friends of Oak Park Dogs, a non-profit organization, said a dog park at Maple could be fashioned after the one at Ridgeland Common with multiple “airlock” gates to keep dogs from escaping, cards to identify owners as Oak Park residents, and vaccinations required for dogs entering.
One man at the meeting who frequents the Ridgeland Common dog park said overcrowding is never a problem, with typically no more than six dogs at the park.
A patch of concrete south of the tennis courts and away from houses, currently used for storage, was suggested as a spot for the park. Mac Manus stressed that a dog park isn’t being proposed, just suggested.
“We have found, and I’m not a dog owner, it’s been a good thing for Oak Park,” Balling said of dog parks, alleging that the adult presence has increased at Ridgeland, which he believes makes the park safer.
Other suggestions included: moving one of the park’s two baseball diamonds further south, rearranging the three tennis courts, making Maple a one-way street south of Fillmore, adding a track or creating a path spanning the entire park from south to north.
Concern was expressed over crime at the park, and some wondered if increasing the police presence and lighting might help.
Parking was also an issue. It’s allegedly scarce on Maple because of youth baseball games and Roosevelt Road business customers. Mac Manus suggested creating 8-foot concrete “bump-outs” behind the two baseball dugouts which might reduce traffic and overcrowded parking while increasing player safety by having them further from the street.
A referendum was passed in 2005 and every park in the village has been undergoing the same process as Maple, Balling said. A total of $425,000 is available to improve Maple Park. Mac Manus said state grants may double that total.
Mac Manus and his partner, Josephine Bellalta, will digest the community’s suggestions and design three different plans for Maple, all with interchangeable parts. He said master planning is a process that may take years and the plan is created before financial details are discussed.
“A master plan gives you a framework,” he said. “It does not give you a list that you’re going to carry out next week.”
A questionnaire was handed out to attendees and another meeting is scheduled at Carroll Center on Monday, Aug. 6 at 7:30 p.m.
Mac Manus asked people living closest to the park to give all of Oak Park a chance to voice their thoughts on Maple. In past experiences creating master plans for Lincoln Park and other areas, he experienced people getting defensive of the space near their home.
“Someone living here thinks this is theirs, psychologically, but the reality is, it’s a park for the entire community,” he said.