[Durham INC] let's help the City with ideas...

[Randy Pickle]

I do believe they are already on top of some of this. For the past few
years, a contractor has mowed half of our parks. As I understood Beth Timson
to say, that is changing and Parks and Rec. is going back to taking care of
them. I'm sure this was done because they looked at the costs. In general,
the contractor has done a fair job of keeping Forest Hills Park in
reasonable shape. I say fair and reasonable because at times, the grass has
gotten too high. So when it's mowed, it looks like a dead grass field from
all of the cut grass that was left from the cutting. Perhaps that has been
due to flooding that happens here and the Park is in the fertile valley.
Hence the grass grows well.

It gets confusing knowing which department is responsible for what. general
Services does most of the mowing, but Parls and Rec. mows as well. Solid
Waste picks up our trash, but Parks and Rech has their own trash trucks and
crews. I never have figured out why one department couldn't do it all.

Earlier it was mentioned that disposal of yard waste at our transfer station
was $40/ton. I believe it's the same as anything else and is $32.50/ton. But
our disposal costs in VA are not the same as disposal costs here. If I'm not
mistaken, our trash in VA costs us over $70/ton.

RWP
27 Beverly


On 3/6/10, TheOcean1 at aol.com <TheOcean1 at aol.com> wrote:
>
>  Randy is right when he says, "Most of the older parks had something for
> the park caretaker to live in. Now City services (or contractors) take care
> of the parks."
>
> Sometimes the progressive step is backwards. Wonder how the costs compare,
> live in/on site caretaker VS City services. Does the City have a specified
> budget for each park's maintenance? I'm sure they have line items, and can
> tell us that xx% is budgeted for programs, it would be interesting to at
> least know the total maintenance budget including equipment and staff.
>
> *Bill *
>
>  In a message dated 3/6/2010 9:36:54 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
> rwpickle at gmail.com writes:
>
>  I eliminated (as Bill put it) my park because at times, I refer to it as
> Lake Beverly because it is all under water. You can have a canoe rental
> business in my front yard. I am much more familiar with the parks I
> mentioned than the others. But I have personally visited around 50 of the
> ones we have; some more frequently than others.
>
> There are 7 parks withing 2 miles of where I live. Does that seem like too
> many? One is as Mike mentioned, the size of a vacant house lot. Within 4
> miles of where I live, it jumps to 13 parks. It's almost as if every
> neighborhood at one time had it's own park.
>
> The bath house at Northgate functions as seasonl. They turn the water off
> sometime in Oct. and on again after the chance of freezing is over. It's
> tied to the dog park water system, so we don't have water for the dog park
> during this time frame either...
>
> The house at Northgate Park that Bill referred to is uninhabitable. As I
> was told, it has a fuzzy covering of mold throughout. Maybe you could gut it
> to the framework and sort of start over, but where are the funds coming from
> to do that? Forest Hills has an apartment attached to the clubhouse.
> Typically it has been rented to Police officers, but I think it's vacant
> now. Duke Park has one as well. It's the house the golf course maintenance
> division operates out of (below the bath house). Most of the older parks had
> something for the park caretaker to live in. Now City services (or
> contractors) take care of the parks.
>
> Another desirable park for redevelopment is at the end of Garrett Rd. It
> mainly houses the tennis courts that the school system uses. Most of that
> would be prime commercial development with what has been built around it.
> It, like many of our parks, are not "neighborhood" parks. Most of the
> visitors/use they get has to travel there by car/bike/bus/etc. There's no
> reason they couldn't just drive to the next closest park instead...
>
> Bill's right. Don't send your ideas to. Just post them here. perhaps it
> will be like the open source software conversation where someone else on the
> list has some additional thoughts (one way or the other). Most of this list
> is involved in this community and gets to see first hand what seems to work
> and what doesn't. Perhaps what doesn't work is a corner we can improve upon
> (budget-wise or otherwise).
>
> RWP
> 27 Beverly
>
>
>
>
>
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