Facing challenges with the operation and maintenance of seasonal ice rinks and volleyball courts at Centennial Park, the Naperville Park District is surveying residents to determine interest and usage.
An online questionnaire at napervilleparks.org/centennialparkbasin seeks public feedback through April 25.
Centennial Park, located at 500 W. Jackson Ave., offers outdoor ice rinks in the winter and sand volleyball courts during warmer months. The catch is that both are accommodated through a stormwater basin at the park, a location that presents extra difficulties in making the amenities available, especially since both are weather dependent, officials say.
“This is an area where stormwater will typically flow before it’s released out to the river,” park district Executive Director Brad Wilson said. “What we find is that it creates a lot of challenges.”
Sand volleyball courts can be subject to flooding when there’s heavy rain, limiting public access, according to the district. And even when conditions are favorable, exposure to moisture can affect sand quality and playability, district officials say.
The location can also make it hard for staff to consistently manufacture ice for winter rink use, Wilson said. The district’s four natural outdoor ice rinks are only able to open after a stretch of consistently cold temperatures of 15 degrees or below.
Because Centennial’s rink is located in a detention basin, it’s “very difficult to get the ice to form,” Wilson said. The district has “found that we spend more time trying to make ice and get it to a safe and usable point at that particular location,” Wilson said.
In a typical winter season, the time it takes district staff to set up, maintain and take down ice rink infrastructure is about 716 labor hours, which equates to nearly 30 days, according to the district. Over the past five years, there has been an annual average of 11 available skating days at Centennial, officials estimate.
The survey will help the district make future plans by getting an idea of how often residents use the rinks and courts and where they might be relocated were they to be moved, Wilson said.
It also asks participants whether they’d like to see the entire detention basin at Centennial converted into a spot for native plantings should the district find new locations for the volleyball courts and ice rinks.
“We’re very much at the beginning stages,” Wilson said. “One of the first steps is reaching out to residents and gathering their feedback. … So we’ll take the information that we receive this month as part of the survey and then that will help us with really determining next steps and where we go from there.”