Eight months after Austin Parks and Recreation Department officials first sought citizen input on improvements to Emma Long Metropolitan Park, 1706 City Park Road, Austin, staffers presented proposed changes at their final public meeting July 16 that include a new fee structure and improved infrastructure.
Along with prioritizing the top maintenance projects for the city-owned park, Project Coordinator Kevin Johnson said the public input helped the parks and recreation department develop a long-range vision plan for the green space that fronts Lake Austin and its amenities for the next 20 years.
“The vision plan is aspirational—a build-out of 20 years that would be dependent on future bond funding,” he said, adding that a 2018 bond election may be required for some of the vision plan’s proposed changes.
Funding for the first phase of the plan—which is likely to include adding electrical utilities to the now-primitive tent camping site on the park’s bluff line and repairing worn bulkheads, or piers, because of boat use and lake erosion—will come from a $1.7 million 2012 city of Austin bond, he said. Some of the bond funds have already been spent to repair the road entry at the front of the park, leaving just over $1 million to implement the highest-priority items on the vision plan, Johnson said.
“Everything we are proposing in the vision plan is a multi-year plan with funding that far exceeds what we currently have,” he said. “But we’ll identify Phase 1 construction, and we’ll design and implement 100 percent of our 2012 bond funding.”
The additional electric outlets, water and wastewater on the bluff line will allow for recreational vehicles to camp overnight in the area, a facet of the park that is now constantly full, he said.
“We know there’s demand for RV camping,” he said. “We know the [RV] camp season can be longer than you can comfortably camp with a tent in Texas. The number of RV campsites along the bluff site will be about 30 sites, so that more than doubles the capacity that is offered [to RVs] on the waterfront side.
“What we designed is a more flexible campsite that can work for both tent and RV campers, so you have the option to do the improved utility camping or keep it primitive as a tent camper.”
Additionally, the park intends to change its fee structure from a per-vehicle charge—$5 per day during the week and $10 daily on weekends—to a per-person charge, most likely at an average of $5 a user, said Michael Svetz, operations plan consultant to the parks and recreation department. More staff will be hired to maintain the proposed new facilities, he said.
Austin staff reviewed other similar parks, and Emma Long was the only Central Texas park that had a per-vehicle pay program, Svetz said. Even nationally, pay structures for this type of park are per user, he said.
“At the end of the day, we’re actually proposing that staffing levels get increased, so you have more maintenance, you have more customer service, you have more rangers that would give you the ability to enhance the level of experience that people are desiring,” Svetz said.
The vision plan also includes adding more amenities to the park, such as playscapes, boat docks, gravel trails, sports courts, an outdoor shower, pavilions, food truck parking areas and picnic grounds.
“The plans you are looking at here speak to some of the long-term, pie-in-the-sky improvements, and we want your feedback over what you see in the long term build-out as well as what you feel is most important as to how you use the park today,” Johnson said to the event participants.
Any plan recommendations must be approved by the city’s parks board, he said.
The city’s parks and recreation department staff said it is continuing to solicit public input on the proposal. For more information, visit www.austintexas.gov/emmalongvision
