A new skate park has been dedicated as part of a new $2.4 million Portage Township park on Evergreen Avenue.
The 3.5-acre park is intended to meet a variety of needs with a trail, playground and baseball diamond as well as the skate park, Township Trustee Brendan Clancy said.
Project manager Rich Piazzo of Abonmarche said the idea was to minimize maintenance while providing something for everyone. “They can read a book on a grassy knoll,” he said.
“It was very challenging to get all of it into one site,” Piazzo said. “We maximized the field as big as we could.”
The ball field will have underground irrigation. The city gave the green light Thursday to do the plumbing work so sod can be installed.
“I think it’s great for the neighborhood,” Clancy said.
Clancy remembers playing football in a gravel lot at his school. The park’s neighbors remember playing baseball at the former Portage Little League site. Now their kids will be able to play there, too.
“I knew kids who used to hit home runs onto the Toll Road some years ago,” City Councilman Ferdinand Alvarez said.
Clancy expects the township will offer some programming at the new park but wants neighborhood kids to play there when the ball field is available.
The new park includes a small food truck court with electric and water hookups.
At Thursday’s dedication ceremony for the skate park, NorthShore Health Centers offered free helmets for kids, and a skateboard was being raffled off. A food truck made use of the new food court.
“This has been in the works for probably four years,” Clancy said. As with just about everything else, a COVID-19 pause happened in the planning process.
“This city was starving for a baseball park,” Clancy said. The skate park was needed, too; the old one at Willowcreek Park had become so dilapidated it was torn down more than 10 years ago.
Even the ribbon-cutting ceremony had to be postponed until Thursday because of bad weather the day it was originally to have been dedicated.
At Thursday’s ceremony, Clancy announced International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 531 has purchased naming rights for the park. Details have yet to be worked out. Signage is coming soon.
Doug Ross is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
