In light of tonight’s Town Council meeting planning to address the future of the Ajax basketball court and the proposed playground at Wilmer Park, Ward 2 Councilman Tom Herz has provided the Spy with these outlines:
Wilmer Park Playground:
- The design is based on input from the Town’s Recreation Committee
- The proposed location is inside the top of the loop closest to Quaker Neck Road (convenient to the parking lot).
- The scaled drawing (attached) shows the location in red on a site plan for the general area
- Attached are several 3D drawings of the proposed playground with sampleplayground elements/features.
- The design wraps around the existing treesat this location.
- The playground equipment is by Berliner (https://berliner-playequipment.com/us/). They manufacturer top-quality playgrounds
- The playground is designed for kids 2-12 and meets ADA accessibility requirements
- The playground surface will be a porous rubberized material which is easy to clean and maintain. This eliminates concerns around pooling water and use of materials such as pea gravel, sand, or mulch
- The equipment is designed to last for 50 years. It also comes with a 10 year warranty (30 years for metal elements).
AJAX Court:
- Official plans for the AJAX Court are still pending. The area will remain ‘as is’ for now, but there is interest from residents to improve the area. Suggestions include:
- Removing the current playground equipment (after the Wilmer PG is complete, of course)
- Adding picnic tables and (possibly) fixed grill locations
- Adding a shade area (something like a small pavilion)
- Enhancements to the current court including painting lines on the current surface and so on.
Cheryl Hoopes says
What an amazing report! Thank you!
Marcia and Bob Yeager says
A playground for 2-12 year-olds should be in a residential area where there is easy and safe access. Access to Wilmer Park through
downtown has a dangerous curve, and driving or walking is a hazard. There appears to be a need for additional basketball courts for
teenagers. Putting that near a residential district and displacing small children is not the answer. Please reconsider these plans
Doug West says
Sounds great! Definitely improvements worth doing.
Frederick S. Patt says
One other aspect of Wilmer Park that should be reconsidered is its name. Philip G. Wilmer presided over an utterly racist era of Chestertown’s history.
Bill Arrowood says
Tonight the Council voted to approve this with limited public comment after it was first publicly sent out as an announcement on Monday. Public comment during the meeting was limited to those that signed up in advance on the zoom call, and was mixed at best and merited more discussion. The Council hailed that many in the community supported it, but of course they did, anything is better than nothing. What concerns that were brought up were shelved stating that they could be ironed out down the road once the grant was awarded.
This was the reply I sent to Council this morning. None of these concerns were mentioned by Council during tonight’s meeting, I did not hear back from anyone on Council in advance of the meeting about my concerns.
For the record, I am the founding former chair of the Recreation Commission and have been advocating for parks and playgrounds in town for a very long time. I have a history with writing these grants, their process and how the town has approached them. I believe passionately about not just the need for parks and playgrounds, but how they create community, their design, both aesthetic and civic and desperately want the very best for this town. I am not a naysayer and believe that grants should be applied for and parks and playground should be built, but with best practices in mind, and in my opinion, they were not on display this evening.
TO THE MAYOR & COUNCIL:
Using the reasoning that you have to do something to apply for a fast approaching grant indicates that the Town did not have a plan in place and is rushing a grant without considering if it is the best thing to do, only just trying to get some money to do something.
Doing something isn’t good enough, saying it’s better than nothing is lazy and lacks vision. It also shows that there is a breakdown in long term civic planning if you are rushing to throw together a proposal due in three weeks. This should have been started two years ago after the last grant cycle, so the Town would have a plan in place and be able to spend two years gathering private donors, so that when the cycle came around again, you would have it at the ready. The Town has applied for this grant regularly for at least the last 10 years, so you should know what and when to expect.
Several of the applications for the CP&P grants have all been rushed and thrown together without community vetting and best practices. Who builds a basketball court facing the woods, without putting a fence behind the backstop so balls don’t go in the woods, or builds it in a place where kids can’t safely get there on their own? Who builds a dog park you have to drive your dog to? Its sloppy and novice design both from a public use and community building perspective.
Once upon a time I tried to get the Town to look at Wilmer for a play set, I first presented a plan eight years ago, (and no, none of you were on council then), but it’s not like i didn’t keep talking about it and pushing for it after Mayor Cerino’s term began. The recurring fear of upsetting a dozen neighbors along the backside of Wilmer Park prevented the exploring of possibilities, a giant steel Art Project moved forward without so much as a blip of concern. (And yes, it was largely privately funded, and gosh its shiny).
Aesthetically, everything at Wilmer, (sans giant steel wave), is wood, the pavilion, the bandstand, the benches, it would be foolish to install brightly colored plastic in a riverfront setting. It would look out of place and be very jarring. I had proposed a modest wooden playground with a ship and swings, but that was when the Town had nothing else in public use and that was an attempt to get even the smallest playset available to the public. The small playground at AJAX was a great start. You can build on that and make it a new central point in town.
More recently I’ve offered a plan to Council and the CRC for something grander at the Ajax site only to have it brushed aside and told it was impractical. Yet the Town, (mostly Mayor Cerino) raised enough private capital to fix the marina, (and yes, it’s all very nice, but it was real expensive and you were able to find that capital), and it was also a pretty impractical project, until it wasn’t.
A true redevelopment of the Town’s biggest remaining eyesore is a generational opportunity and I would not trade it away for a measly $150K grant. You need to follow your own comprehensive plan and relocate the Town Shop. That land is ideal for redevelopment as a multiuse asset for the community. The playground could be integrated into the educational element Sultana’s shipyard and the equipment could reflect the maritime and historic themes of the Town.
Parks are meant to be central and gather people together, to bring them downtown so they can walk to shop and dining. They’re meant to be between commerce and residential centers so that they remain integrated in the paths of all citizens. Wouldn’t it be great to go big and make this spectacular and not just add a couple of pieces of equipment to an already busy park.
This grant can be used for phase one of a larger project. Given these things eat budgets $150K would just about cover expanding AJAX, pushing back the fence 50 or so feet into the Town lot, and laying the groundwork for a pavilion.
Phase 2 is the relocation of the shop properly and Phase 3 would be a full scale build ala Robert Leathers, (https://www.playgroundsbyleathers.com/),
designed by kids and built by neighbors with aspects of the Town’s character embedded in its beams.
You are creative, clever passionate public servants,
Don’t be hasty, don’t be lazy, don’t do this just to say you did something.
Do something grand, do something remarkable.
Move the Town shop,
expand Ajax to full court
build a pavilion and
create a centerpiece gathering for the entire community.
Should we not want to strive for the very best, not the good enough?
**(disclosure: some slight edits have been made from my original email for clarification, grammar, but the tone remains the same)
Carol Mylander says
Thank you Bill, well stated.
Earl Runde says
Chestertown has three existing playgrounds: at Washington Park, Garnet Elementary school and Ajax Park. Has a study been done that indicates the need for additional playground capacity or updated equipment? If so, the three existing playgrounds should be improved. Has there been any citizen input on the proposed decision? Would community leisure activities such as bocce ball, The Chestertown Tea Party and the Chestertown Jazz Festival be adversely affected by a 3720 square foot playground? It is understood that the park is also a space allocated for social events that may be impacted by this design and addition. I am saddened that the natural open beauty of Wilmer Park, already used by many for reflection and mindfulness, may no longer be an oasis for meditative opportunities.
Carol Mylander says
Earl,
The reality is families are driving their children to Church Hill Playground and Centreville playground. And what does that
say about how we treat families without cars dealing with our limited playground equipment?
The playground at Garnett was ripped out years ago. Go take a look. Rock Hall has a wonderful new
playground. So, here we are in Chestertown putting tourists first, Sultana second or maybe those
two things are tied. Are we Sultanaville or Chestertown?
Carol Mylander