Parks and rec

One bit of fun that she may arrive too late for — Warner doesn’t start until Aug. 11 — is the ribbon-cutting for the expansion of the lovely little Jardin de Niños park, at the corner of Chestnut Street and Middlefield Road. Historically, that neighborhood park has served young children, but the addition of an adjacent city-owned parcel along Middlefield Road brings a space aimed at neighborhood teens and seniors. This small extension to the park includes benches, outdoor tables with power outlets for working or studying and an “outdoor classroom” shaded by a fanciful metal structure.

Undoubtedly, Warner will be here for the grand opening of the city’s new Veterans Memorial Building/Senior Center in Red Morton Park. That long-overdue project is finally nearing an end. While the city hopes to open this lovely new high-tech building sometime this fall, given the project’s track record, that public opening may slip toward the end of the year. Whenever it actually happens, though, the city’s seniors in particular are going to see a major upgrade — from today’s aging Senior Center to this much larger, more capable structure. And it isn’t just seniors who will benefit — I’ve already heard that one local theater group plans to hold its performances in the new center’s purpose-built theater.

Another ribbon-cutting that the new parks director will likely preside over is the reopening of the Main Street Dog Agility Park, which is being reconstructed as part of the massive ELCO Yards development. The park appears to be gaining much-needed shade structures as well as what seems to be a separately fenced-off area for smaller dogs.

Upgrades to existing parks are certainly welcome, but what Redwood City really needs are more parks. The city currently has more than 30 parks and open spaces, but with roughly 87,000 residents, 30 just isn’t enough. Plus, the parks are not scattered evenly around the city — some neighborhoods have more than others. Excluding tiny “parklets” and parks within parks (such as the Magical Bridge Playground in Red Morton Park), the city has 23 principal parks. And of those 23, seven are located in the Redwood Shores neighborhood. Contrast that with Redwood City’s Bair Island, Eagle Hill and downtown neighborhoods — all of which, today, have none.

Eagle Hill is not likely to ever gain a significant new park — all of the available land appears to be privately owned and already developed — but it is a small neighborhood surrounded by neighborhoods with parks. So, many Eagle Hill residents needn’t go far to enjoy one of the city’s parks. As for residents of Bair Island and downtown, parks for those neighborhoods are in the works. Plans have recently been completed for both the downtown library park and the Redwood Creek Recreation Loop — meaning that one of the new director’s early tasks will be to oversee the construction of both a good-sized, multifaceted park by the library and a park-like fitness course stretching alongside Redwood Creek from some point north of Veterans Boulevard out to — and possibly beyond — Highway 101.

Then there’s the city’s future Bayfront Park, which would be located on city-owned land along Maple Street between Blomquist Street and Redwood Creek in the Bair Island neighborhood. Although that park is still in the concept stage, the city intends to initiate a community engagement process by the end of this year to collect resident input that will guide the park’s design.

If all that isn’t enough, the redesign of Hoover Park was completed earlier this year, and construction is soon to begin — making it a project that our new parks director will be able to oversee from beginning to end.

If the job were just “Parks,” that’d be one thing — but Warner will undoubtedly have plenty to do related to the “Recreation” and “Community Services” parts of her job as well. I once thought it would be fun to be the director of the city’s Parks, Recreation and Community Services Department, but on second thought, I think I’ll just enjoy all the department does as a resident of Redwood City.