The Crookston Park Board met on Tuesday to review the capital improvements planned for 2022. They also received an update on the RV campground that will be installed in Central Park this summer.
The RV Campground is budgeted for $1.79 million, offset by a $1.35 million grant from the Greater Minnesota Parks and Trails. Riopelle shared a concept plan from the grant with the Park Board and said he’ll be meeting with engineers beginning Wednesday on creating the official design and engineering for approximately 40 full hookup campsites. “We had a rendering that we got from WSN that they’d put together,” said Riopelle. “We wanted to introduce it to the Park Board tonight and let them see what it will entail. Everything will be driven by what the grant allows us to put in and what is covered by the grant. Once we come up with a plan, we’ll get them to do the site drawings and go from there.”
The City’s matching portion of the grant will go to build the bathhouse which would have approximately four stalls and two showers for both men and women. The site would have full electric and sewer hookup, with the ability to be removed during flood season. “The sewer and stuff could not be removed,” said Riopelle. “We would be able to hopefully remove the electrical. You get quick disconnects on the boxes because they can’t go underwater which saves us from redoing them each time they go underwater. That’s done in other places, so it’s nothing new and will be in the design package.”
The current skate park will be removed as part of the project, and a playground would eventually be added on top of the hill near the pool. “On the north end of Central Park, down below, there is an old skate park,” said Riopelle. “We built a new one out at Highland Park. We would have to take this one out of service because they don’t mix really well with the campground. Up above, northeast of the pool, there is a flat area we’re looking at putting new playground equipment in so the users of the campground would have a place to bring their children and play up there. There were some drawings with volleyball courts and whatnot up there. That’s stuff we can see if we can add later. That’s not part of the grant. That would be on our dime, so that would be in our 2022 capital improvement plan.”
The campground will have to be designed, approved by both the Park Board and City Council, and go out for bid this spring to hopefully start construction in June. With the campground moving in, Central Park would no longer be able to hold a number of events, but Riopelle said the city has already identified a landing spot for those events. “Some of our former events – the rodeo, Night2Unite – we don’t have the big open green space,” said Riopelle. “We’ll have a green space down below, but it won’t be big enough to hold those activities. We’ve looked at other areas of the city, other parks such as Castle Park as a good area to handle that. In fact, I’ve talked to the rodeo people about hosting it at that site rather than Central. We don’t have all of those big activities (in Central Park) but we hope we’ll have a lot of people at the campground. It will be a nice addition to the community and great for people that want to come to utilize the river. Or just for those passing through to have a nice place to stay.”
Some events, like the Ox Cart Days, had previously stopped using Central Park in anticipation of the campground being constructed. City Councilman Wayne Melbye suggested that a public forum be held once the plans have progressed before going out for bids to gather input. Riopelle said a Park Board meeting this spring will probably be entirely focused on the campground and that they are open meetings for the public to attend.
The Park Board also reviewed the upcoming Parks and Recreation Capital improvements approving the 2022 list for consideration in budgeting for next year. “For 2022, there are some capital improvements at the Crookston Sports Center and pool,” said Riopelle. “We always have upgrades. The CSC is the easiest one for me to come with something, like new rubber in some of the landing areas but we always have upgrades. We always have our matching grant program, $5,000, as part of the capital improvements. That’s a pretty good deal because for every dollar we spend on that with somebody, somebody else spends a dollar, so we get a two-for-one out of it in our parks. There is some stuff we put in for park benches and picnic tables for repairs or if we have to buy some new ones each year. There is a mower. I think we’re looking at that is a big one with 10.5-11-foot cuts instead of one of the smaller six-footers.”
The proposed capital improvements through 2024 are listed below –
| 2022 | ||
| Picnic Tables/Benches | $1,000 | |
| Park Development Matching Funds | $5,000 | |
| Arena Improvements | $10,000 | |
| Electric Zamboni Battery Reserve | $4,000 | |
| Mower | $65,000 | |
| Playground Equipment (Pool/Campground) | $40,000 | |
| Pool | $20,000 | |
| Total | $145,000 | |
| 2023 | ||
| Picnic Tables/Benches | $1,000 | |
| Park Development Matching Funds | $5,000 | |
| Arena Improvements | $10,000 | |
| Electric Zamboni Battery Reserve | $4,000 | |
| Mower | $65,000 | |
| Playground Equipment | $40,000 | |
| Pool | $10,000 | |
| Total | $135,000 | |
| 2024 | ||
| Picnic Tables/Benches | $1,000 | |
| Park Development Matching Funds | $5,000 | |
| Arena Improvements | $10,000 | |
| Electric Zamboni Battery Reserve | $4,000 | |
| Mower | $40,000 | |
| Playground Equipment | $40,000 | |
| Pool | $10,000 | |
| Groomer | $25,000 | |
| Total | $135,000 |
