More than fifty people came to the Platte County Community Center South last week for an open house hosted by the Platte County Parks Master Plan.
One of the goals of the updated master plan is to expand the trails network. The plan calls for increasing the amount of trails in the county from 15 miles to 60 miles.
This expansion includes the connection of the Missouri Riverfront Trail, Brush Creek Greenway, Southern Platte Pass, and Line Creek Trail. Other projects are to create the Platte River Greenway trails and Bee Creek Greenway trails, and expand the Prairie Creek Greenway. The parks department also hopes to create a diverse network of trail experiences including trails for horses, backpacking, canoeing, and mountain bikes.
Another portion of the plan calls for expanding the Platte County Community Center North to include dedicated aerobics rooms, meeting spaces, a larger gymnasium, and more aquatics areas. A third community center could be constructed to ease the overcrowding at the Platte County Community Center South.
The department hopes to develop more parks including the recently purchased land west of English Landing Park, land at 52nd and Northwood Road near Riverside, and land near Weston at P Highway and Spratt Road.
Possible park developments could include trails, playgrounds, dog parks, picnic areas, fishing areas, un-programmed open space and special areas for music, arts and cultural heritage sites.
The people attending the open house were also invited to fill out a survey after viewing the information.
Thirty people filled out the surveys and provided comments about the plan.
Of the people who responded in the survey, 67 percent said that making 500 acres of land available for conservation and recreation over the next 20 years is a reasonable goal. Around 29 percent said more land should be protected and four percent said no more land needed to be protected.
Another question asked whether the current community centers should be expanded and enhanced. Of those surveyed, 71 percent said the centers should be expanded and 29 percent said they should not.
The last question on the survey is whether to renew the parks sales tax for up to 20 years. Ninety-six percent said they were supportive of the tax and only four percent thought the tax was not important.