GREENFIELD – Riley Park in Greenfield is in the midst of a major facelift.
The large pavilion that sits at the center of the park recently got an upgrade, a year after the nearby playground and restrooms on the south side of the park did.
The improvements are part of a larger plan to refresh and repurpose much of the 40-acre park in preparation for its 100th anniversary celebration next year.
Riley Memorial Park was dedicated on Oct. 7, 1925, on what would have been James Whitcomb Riley’s 76th birthday. The famed poet laureate, who was born and raised in Greenfield, died in 1916 at the age of 66.
Greenfield Parks director Ellen Kuker said her staff is excited to be renovating Riley’s namesake park in preparation for its centennial celebration.
“It’s an exciting time for the parks,” said Kuker, who joined the department in 2012.
Construction is well underway at the Riley Park Shelter House, which has risen from the ashes after the previous shelter house was destroyed by fire in late 2022.
Kuker said the next step is sprucing up the adjacent Patricia Elmore Center, which houses the parks office, senior center and preschool.
The building’s faded red accents will be painted a deep shade of green to coordinate with the parks department’s branding, which was updated four years ago.
“From the newly painted pavilion and restrooms to the shelter house and Elmore center, we want everything in Riley Park to have a cohesive look,” said Kuker.
Big vision
The recent enhancements are all part of a bigger plan to fully re-imagine the century-old Riley Park.
In 2020, the parks department hired Pros Consulting to help draft a plan for a revisioned Riley Park after the Greenfield Youth Baseball Association announced plans to move its league out of the park, which was equipped with five baseball fields.
“With all those fields no longer necessary, it opened us up to many new possibilities for the park,” said Kuker.
“Pros Consulting helped us through the community input processes to see how we could better serve the community going forward,” she said.
The parks department narrowed its first focus to two areas within the park – a dedicated children’s zone on the south end of the park and a teen zone on the north end of the park near the Hancock Boys & Girls Clubs.
The future teen zone will feature a skate park and a multi-sport synthetic playing field.
One of the most prominent new features of the park – a pump track – will be constructed just east of the club.
A pump track is named such because riders generate momentum by pumping their bodies up and down, instead of pedaling or pushing, while traveling across a series of rollers, berms, ramps and hills which help fuel the momentum.
Kuker said the parks department is working with Pumptrax USA to create the track, which is estimated to cost $237,000.
Construction is scheduled to start Oct. 1, with the hope of opening the track next spring.
Master plan
Kuker said all the proposed Riley Park improvements are part of the Greenfield Parks Master Plan, which is updated every five years, mostly recently this past spring.
The master plan serves as the playbook for future parks improvements, said Kuker, although budgetary constraints have prevented the city from moving forward on many of the larger-scale projects.
The city was able to cover the most recent Riley Park improvements through some leftover funds awarded through the American Rescue Plan Act, which was created to reinvigorate communities after the COVID shutdown.
The parks departments used those funds to make the upgrades to Riley Park’s pavilion, playground and restrooms.
“Our approach was to go ahead and put some money into the amenities we already have and bring those to a higher level, because when we find the money to create the children’s zone and teen zone we’re going to want all our support buildings to look great,” said Kuker.
Just last month, work was completed on the park’s large pavilion, which sits alongside Brandywine Creek in the center of the park.
“The pavilion was structurally compromised from years of flooding that the park experiences, so we encapsulated the bottom of the posts that support the roof in concrete,” said Josh Gentry, Maintenance Operations Manager for the parks department.
The pavilion also got a new roof, which was divided in the center by an open-air pergola feature which lets the sunlight in.
“We were noticing that people who did rent the pavilion were typically only using about half or a third of it, so it’s just too big for most people’s needs,” said Kuker.
“We thought in order to make it a more intimate gathering space we’d divide it into spaces with the pergola in between, so now the pavilion can be rented out as two separate spaces or all together,” she said.
Each end features multiple picnic tables, a grill and trash can, with green space all around.
Last summer the parks department renovated the nearby playground by the basketball courts on the south side of the park, with some new decking, the installation of a plastic barrier to impede flooding and a new coat of paint.
The two restrooms by the playground also got a major makeover, with a log cabin look created with brown board and batten siding and a shingled roof.
Gentry said the bathrooms were completely gutted and rebuilt to make them compliant with the American Disabilities Act.
“We are making inclusivity a part of everything we do moving forward,” said Gentry, which means all future parks and playground upgrades will include accessibility for people of all abilities.
