News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Cookeville City Council rejected a bid from a Kentucky company to construct a pedestrian bridge in Dogwood Park Thursday.
The pedestrian bridge was originally included in Leisure Services’ master plan approximately 10 years ago outlining improvements for the park.
Director Rick Woods said rejecting the bid will allow them to reevaluate their master plan.
“A plan update may be appropriate. We have updated property since that plan was done,” Woods said. “The property on 1st Street that we often call the Bennett Property… that was not part of the master planning process. That was not our property then so it was not included.”
Woods said Dogwood Park has undergone several changes and has seen many different uses since the master plan was put together over a decade ago.
“It may be something that Council decides that they want to get input on from the community to update that plan based on that community input,” Woods said.
Vice-Mayor Laurin Wheaton said during Monday’s work session she would like to see more pathways constructed through that portion of the park.
“I think they kind of talked about that last time about those sidewalks and picnic tables,” Wheaton said. “That’s what I would like to see a little bit more of. I think the bridge is beneficial, but I think this might be a little more beneficial.”
Woods said during the work session that the master plan originally called for an event center to be built in the park. However, that plan may no longer be possible.
“Because of the way the park got developed, there’s really no space for it,” Woods said. “It was originally designed to go behind Borden’s Jewelry, and because of the way we redid the creek… there’s no longer enough space there to build what the committee thought would be a nice edition to the park. Adn that is a special events facility that could be rented with a nice outdoor and indoor space.”
Woods said although the department doesn’t have the funding to build such a facility, he would still like to see the an event center built at some point.
“I see it as a little bit higher scale, upper-scale kind of venue that would be a nice addition to the park and would fulfill the desire of the original master plan and that committee,” Woods said, “and also would honor some of the requests that we have now [from citizens] for special events they would like to occur in Dogwood Park.”
According to Woods, the master plan was originally created by a 15-person citizen community in early 2007 based on what the park’s needs were at the time.
