City officials say County’s altered Platte Landing plan does not deliver promised amenities
The future of Platte Landing Park and its “road to nowhere” was up in the air Tuesday evening during a two and one-half hour discussion between the Board of Aldermen, the Community Land and Recreation Board (CLARB) and Platte County officials.
CLARB and the Board held a joint meeting to discuss a greatly altered plan for the park with Platte County Director of Parks and Recreation Brian Nowotny and 1st District Commissioner Beverlee Roper in attendance. The boards were asked to either move ahead with a greatly scaled back version of phase one of park development, or possibly to abandon the project altogether. While CLARB voted 6-2 to move ahead, the Board of Aldermen voted unanimously to go forward, minus absent alderman Chris Fisher.
However, none of them were happy about the vote, and the approvals were made with the caveats that PlatteCounty return to them with estimated costs to add back several amenities the boards felt were promised to voters.
Mayor Jim Brooks prefaced the discussion by telling the Board the plans presented to the City and the public last year –—which included a plaza, boardwalk and even an amphitheater — were for the most part no longer feasible due to cost and time issues, and the plan as presented was a compromise solution to allow the City and County to leverage state and federal funding to get a start on the project.
“In some sense, this plan doesn’t make the best business sense, but it will give us over 200 acres of Riverfront park space that will be unparalleled in the area,” Brooks said.
While the plan no longer included the construction of ballfields that would help the City defray the day-to-day maintenance costs of the Park, Brooks said he believed the Park would still drive traffic to Parkville and provided the opportunity for future development.
The approximately $2.25 million phase one project as presented Tuesday evening would include the construction of a boat ramp, restrooms, dog park, parking lot for Grigsby Field, limited walking trail and a very long roadway that became the major sticking point during discussions.
The Platte County Commission hoped to go to bid with the project next month and begin construction of the boat ramp in September to meet the end-of-year deadline.