Asheville Reporter

At its August 27 meeting, Asheville City Council adopted Recreate Asheville: Shaping Our City’s Parks, a 10-year vision plan built by community members to guide the City of Asheville’s parks and recreation decisions. This plan identifies which recreation spaces need the most work, which projects will be most beneficial, and strategies to keep the Asheville Parks & Recreation (APR) system in great shape for the community.

“We are thrilled with this roadmap that will help plan, build, and maintain public spaces in smarter and more beneficial ways,” according to D. Tyrell McGirt. “There will always be general maintenance and emergency repairs with a parks and recreation system as vast and aging as Asheville’s, but the Recreate Asheville plan allows us to use highly reliable data from surveys, workshops, and events coupled with the current state of the system to plan for short- and long-term projects that our community deserves. We heard it loud and clear: give the most people the most access to recreation programs and spaces. And we will use our community’s input to do just that.”

Prioritizing projects allows equitable due diligence for planning, funding, and delivering great community investments rather than reacting to well-resourced special interest groups and connected individuals. While many community members said they love the city’s existing parks, they are also ready to build the foundation of an APR system to serve modern needs for decades.

Residents’ desired parks and recreation priority projects were identified through various methods including statistically valid surveys mailed citywide for 95% accurate results, public open surveys online and at events, workshops, focus groups, listening sessions, and pop-up events. This information was combined with anticipated future needs and comparisons to similarly sized cities’ parks systems.

The Recreate Asheville plan is essential for grant opportunities and partnerships needed to implement projects. Additionally, Asheville voters have the opportunity to approve $20 million in general obligation bonds during the upcoming election. If approved, these bonds will fund many Phase 1: Short Term (1-4 year) projects prioritized in the plan.

APR Director McGirt’s presentation on this topic is available on the City of Asheville’s YouTube channel (begins at 4:24:50), with slides viewable online.

Recreate Asheville Phase 1: Short Term (1-4 Years) Projects include:

- Six major park upgrades or redevelopment projects at Burton Street Park, Malvern Hills Park, Murray Hill Park Recreation Area, Roger Farmer Park Recreation Area.

- Two major community center redevelopment projects at Linwood Crump Shiloh Community Center.

- One new neighborhood park on Sweeten Creek Road.

- Two new major facilities including a pickleball complex.

- Addressing significant deferred maintenance across the system.

Recreate Asheville includes short-, medium-, and long-term goals encompassing various programs:

Programming prioritizes recreational activities; maintenance addresses existing infrastructure needs; upgrades renovate current parks; redevelopment transforms existing centers; new parks build neighborhood facilities; special amenities develop unique features.

The plan outlines five key focus areas for strategic investment:

Steward & Maintain Parks for All

Access & Connectivity

Community Health & Wellness

Gathering & Placemaking

Resilient Natural Environments

Investment zones are identified based on geographic areas with high needs considering equity factors such as current condition size served experiences.

Join APR Director McGirt for one-on-one or small group conversations during casual “Park Bench Chats” over coming months.

“We believe that our parks system is strongest when it reflects needs desires of our community,” said McGirt. “I had many wonderful conversations during workshops building Recreate Plan so designed quarterly Chats events natural extension keep conversation going relaxed settings.”

Sign up for a 20-minute slot up-to 45 days before each date at link https://calendar.app.google/XaWFW4tavbScNQ2s7 Drop-ins may accommodated if time allows:

October 4 from 8-11am Burton Street Community Center

January 13 from 3-6pm Tempie Avery Montford Community Center

April 9 from 5-8pm Linwood Crump Shiloh Community Center

Asheville Parks & Recreation manages over sixty-five public spaces including playgrounds centers swimming pools Riverside Cemetery sports fields courts offering wellness education culture-related programs ten miles paved greenways numerous trails complete portfolio foundation vibrant hub connecting neighbors exploring beauty livable walkable city driven promise better safer place everyone supported healthy successful first nationally-accredited municipal department latest updates sign up monthly newsletter follow Facebook Instagram visit www.ashevillenc.gov/parks