Long-awaited Davey Glen Park comes to Belmont: City first considered Central Neighborhood park nearly 25 years ago, will open by year’s end

Tuesday finally marked a significant step toward actually providing residents in the neighborhood with this new park as the City Council voted to approve putting the project out for bid. Despite prior indications the park on Davey Glen Drive near El Camino Real would have been completed years earlier, officials are confident they’ll kick off construction in the coming months.

“We’re almost ready to put shovel to dirt,” said Mayor Eric Reed. “The city as a whole is severely under parked and the Central Neighborhood where Davey Glen Park is located, is significantly under parked.”

The city plans to develop about a third to half of the nearly 1-acre park with a rain garden to filter stormwater runoff, a playground, a small synthetic turf area, picnic benches and concrete pathways that will make an excellent place for kids to learn how to ride a bike, said Parks and Recreation Director Jonathan Gervais.

“It’s a once in a generational experience,” Gervais said, thrilled to be building a new park. “This will be the second park we’ve built in Belmont since the 1970s, so it’s a great opportunity to provide opportunities to a really underserved neighborhood. This neighborhood has about one-tenth of the park space they should have, so it really provides a fairly dense neighborhood with a great opportunity to recreate.”

Like others across the Bay Area, Belmont’s population continues to grow and city officials are striving to maintain enough parks and open space to meet demand. The Central Neighborhood has about 6,500 residents, but very minimal park or open space. Ideally, Belmont seeks to provide 3 acres of parks or open space for every 1,000 residents, Gervais said.

Currently, it maintains 14 developed parks spread across 31 acres as well as 337 acres of open space, according to the city.

“While we have a lot of open space in Belmont, and we’re rightfully proud of that and protective of that, we’re also under parked when compared with some other communities in the area,” said Vice Mayor Charles Stone. “With Belmont’s demographics shifting with more and more families with children moving in, as far as I’m concerned, we can’t have enough parks.”

Creation of the park has taken longer than ideal, perhaps in part due to some of the neighbors initially disagreeing on what type of amenities they’d like at Davey Glen. Stone added he’s pleased city funds set aside for parks are actually being spent in the neighborhood; particularly as a new mixed-use housing development recently approved down the street at 490 El Camino Real will be contributing nearly $2 million in fees for park and open space improvements.

To make Davey Glen Park a reality, the city has agreed to spend about $1.2 million on construction, up to $120,000 on playground equipment and $156,000 for landscape design over the last seven years. It will also spend no more than $125,000 for tree work and the removal of remove 49 trees, which include 45 eucalyptus, according to city documents.

Gervais said they plan to begin taking down trees by April before beginning construction in May. The site should open about six to seven months later, he added.

“This park has been in the works for 25 years,” Gervais said. “It’s wonderful to see it coming to fruition.”

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