Mississippi riverside park takes shape in Brainerd

BRAINERD — Building on Brainerd’s latest park is underway.

Fragments of crumbled blacktop met metropolis officers who ceremoniously broke floor on Mississippi Touchdown Trailhead Park Monday, June 6.

As crews get to work, new inexperienced house with trails and pathways, a group amphitheater, an outside classroom, steps right down to the river and different facilities will take form alongside the shores of the Mississippi River on East River Highway, changing the present parking zone in that space.

“This park is sort of particular to me as a result of clearly that is the primary park that I get to be part of creating,” Mayor Dave Badeaux stated throughout Monday’s ceremony. “However moreso, it’s the first park that we get to truly take up a bodily parking zone and take away it and switch it into inexperienced house.”

Typically talking towards parking heaps and for extra on-street parking, Badeaux stated he was honored to contribute to the undertaking.

“If I might be part of a undertaking that’s concerned with eradicating a tough floor, getting the parking onto the road the place it belongs after which creating an area that our residents can use at present but in addition our generations of residents can use sooner or later, it’s one thing that I’m proud to be part of,” he stated.

Work on the brand new park dates again to 2014, when the Brainerd Metropolis Council created the Mississippi Partnership Plan and created the Brainerd Riverfront Committee, tasked with connecting the town’s neighborhoods to the river. In 2017, the group got here up with the concept for Mississippi Trailhead Touchdown Park.

“The concept of Brainerd connecting with the river — not simply any river, the third largest river on the earth — just isn’t a brand new thought,” stated Riverfront Committee Chair Don Gorham. “This was an thought introduced up by others. And other people tried, and other people sort of bought slightly cynical like, ‘Oh, we’ll by no means get it carried out. It’s simply one other good concept that’s simply gonna keep as a plan and that’s what’s going to occur.’ We had been in a position to show them unsuitable.”

Nearly all of the park is predicted to be accomplished this summer time, with metropolis officers hoping to have a ribbon-cutting ceremony by the top of the yr.

Funds for the undertaking

got here within the type of $2.85 million from the Environmental and Pure Sources Belief Fund, awarded by the Minnesota Legislature’s Legislative Citizen Fee on Minnesota Sources. However with bids coming in underneath the finances, the town is predicted to have greater than $500,000 left after the park’s development. That cash doesn’t have for use till 2024, so metropolis officers can determine what varieties of additives or upgrades they wish to make when development is accomplished.

Although the park is lastly coming collectively, Gorham reminded these in attendance Monday the Riverfront Committee’s work just isn’t but carried out.

“It is a starting. We’ve much more work left. We’ve a lot extra potential in our city,” he stated. “… Our primary mission the Metropolis Council gave us in 2014 was join the neighborhoods in Brainerd to the river. That was the fundamental mission. I don’t assume it’s carried out. I believe we’re simply getting began. I see a variety of thrilling tasks sooner or later and many various methods we are able to do that. We are able to make this a river city once more.”