SRF assisted the City of Brooklyn Park in developing a community driven planning process to develop an action-oriented park system plan to guide the City’s development and funding over the next 10 years. Visioning themes were developed to guide park and trail improvement initiatives and incorporated within eight priority park focus areas. Cost estimates were prepared and incorporated into funding models which were used to evaluate and determine priorities for implementation. Other tools used included bench marking comparable communities to determine which types of amenities were needed in the City, along with completing an equity analysis to determine whether any parts of the City were under served to meet user group needs. Focus areas for improvements included building or expanding special use facilities, increase connectivity of the existing trail system, adding/ improving athletic field/court facilities, improving access and connections to natural amenities, and improving the safety/conveniences for park users.
Primary components of the park system plan included:
- Inventory of 60 park system and improvement recommendations
- Trail system inventory, gap analysis, and improvement recommendations
- High level conceptual design for redevelopment of 8 “signature” park facilities
- System reinvestment plan
- Natural resource management framework
- Identification of key corridors and park properties best suited for natural resource management