Boosted by economy, Richmond makes headway on trails

Vela anticipated the park would be completed by June with 3,800 linear feet of trail and a 5,000-square-foot pond on two tiered levels.

Wessendorff is Richmond’s newest destination park, but also its last as city officials look to build smaller parks in the future.

“No more big parks are needed,” said Robert Haas, Richmond’s Parks and Recreation board chairman and member of the board of directors for the DCR.

Haas said the city is in the middle of updating its parks master plan, which is expected to be complete in March.

While talking with community stakeholders this year, he said parks officials identified a need for two or three pocket parks.

“What we need are neighborhood parks with a playground in them and an exercise area,” he said.

Wessendorff Park

The Wessendorff Park project will cost nearly $2 million in total. About 60 percent of the cost was funded by grant money from the George Foundation, the Henderson-Wessendorff Foundation and the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. The other 40 percent is provided by the DCR, which pays for projects using a portion of sales tax revenue.

One issue the city discovered in finishing Wessendorff Park is a lack of parking in and around downtown Richmond. The concern was voiced at a DCR meeting on Nov. 1.

Vela said the city would move limestone that is stored at the park and use it to define the lake feature, which would free up an area for a shared parking lot. Both business patrons and parkgoers can use it, she said.

“Currently, we’ve got a new parking area across the street from the police station. It supplies the same amount of parking spaces that our current Wessendorf Park allows, so that should—I would think—help with some of those challenges with parking,” Vela said.

Vela said she does not think construction at the park should have an affect on local businesses.

“Our first phase [of building the park] didn’t impact anybody but our police station and when I say police station, they looked out and saw the work being done, but it didn’t impact anybody negatively,” she said.

Trail plans

The trails master plan was approved in 2015 and calls for more connectivity through five areas residents identified as needing more connectivity: North Richmond, the Greater Historic District, the YMCA-Justice Center-Brazos River area, the Fort Bend Technical Center area and the interstate area.

“We wanted each area to have some access to trails for hiking and jogging and that sort of thing,” Mayor Evalyn Moore said.

While the city’s other major park, George Park, currently has a trail, Vela said, and the trail system could possibly extend to Jane Long Street in the future.

A new park called Freeman Town Park, estimated to cost $140,000, is still being considered and could be completed in April.

“We have a plan for a trail that’ll go from the new Freeman Town Park all along the bayou and will connect up with the YMCA,” Moore said. “We’re trying to also plan it to connect that with the park that’s behind the Justice Center—the historic park—so that’s one of our trails that we have on the drawing board right now.”

Moore also cited Clay Park as another place with a trail in the works. She said she expected the city to start on either the Freeman Town or Clay project after Wessendorff is completed.

Funding

The jump on park and trail projects can be attributed to an increase in sales tax revenue, Moore said.

“This master plan is supposed to be a 20-year plan,” Moore said. “If you look at [city revenue], it looks like we can move forward quicker than that, and that depends on the economy, on sales tax revenue, which we’re increasing now.”

Sales tax revenue increased by $445,098 from the previous year due to new commercial growth and an increase in consumer spending, according to 2015 city financial documents.

“It’s been a process,” Moore said. “Our sales taxes have been gradually increasing for about four or five years.”

She said during the recent recession, sales tax remained fairly flat. From 2012 to 2015, however, the city of Richmond experienced about a $1 million increase in sales tax revenue.

“The last two years, [sales taxes] have increased at a greater rate as we’ve had new businesses, new restaurants that have opened and we’ve annexed a few little pieces of land where we have new commercial development,” Moore said.