More Park for Parkville
Platte County’s newest park is set to become Parkville’s – and the region’s — latest treasure.
Drawing on reserves from their acquisition budget, Platte County officials have agreed to purchase 128 acres of riverfront property from Brian and Wanda Kringle, long time area farmers, for the purpose of creating a multi-use park. The property, which cost $1.28 million to acquire, sits due west of English Landing Centre.
“This has been a part of our master plan,” Platte County Parks and Recreation Director Brian Nowotny told The Luminary. “The riverfront trail and acquiring land around the river has been a priority.”
Nowotny said the county and the Kringles, whom he hailed as “great Platte Countians…very community minded,” have been in talks for more than a year. At last Thursday’s Platte County Commission meeting, the agreement was approved. Nowotny said the deal should close in about 3-4 weeks.
“The county needs more parks, and this works out for the community. That’s why we did it,” Brian Kringle, who has farmed in the area for 22 years, explained. “We’re happy to do it.”
Nowotny told The Luminary that there are no immediate plans for converting the property into a park and no name for the park has been decided upon, although the Kringle family is likely to see their name on any sort of sports complex or structure built inside the park. Plans are to start small.
“We obviously want to extend the trail out of English Landing Park,” Nowotny said, noting that many visitors to the park walk through the property there anyway. “We might go in during the next 12 months, so some clearing out, put down some wood chips, but we really want Parkville’s partnership, too. We want [Parkville] to help plan it.”
To that end, Nowotny says he envisions several public meetings, the presentation of a master plan and then execution of the project – something that may be well off into the future.
“It could be done in five years or 20 years…the bottom line is, we have a beautiful piece of property there that will remain in the public’s hands forever,” Nowotny said.
In 2000, Platte County voters approved a ½ cent sales tax for the purpose of creating a parks and recreation program. Prior to the tax, Platte County had only one park in their system, just off Barry Road.