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Two Rivers Park plans firm up

Jack Reyering
jreyering@postindepedent.com
Renderings of planned future Two Rivers Park features and uses.
Staff Photo |

Following a work session with the Glenwood Springs City Council, the Parks and Recreation Department will move ahead in planning improvements to the Two Rivers Park shoreline.

The Two Rivers shoreline improvement team has been hard at work, coming up with design concepts for improvements to the park’s overlooked and underutilized shoreline.

Following presentations to the river commission and Parks and Recreation commission and their work session with City Council, the shoreline improvement team is excited about the enthusiasm being generated.



One of the designers is architect Jim Leggitt from studioINSITE in Denver. He has 35 years of experience on projects like this and is happy with the progress the team is making.

“We want people to be able to use the park in a way they haven’t since it’s been opened.”

Parks and Rec director Tom Barnes

“City Council was very excited about the entire project,” Leggitt said. “There was a general consensus that that is a great idea and that this is really worth pursuing.”



Parks and Rec director Tom Barnes agreed with Leggitt.

“It was so cool the level of involvement of the council and just seeing that this is a big deal,” Barnes said. “Obviously, they have to be concerned with the costs, but we will be able to provide them with some numbers as we go forward. It’s very cool that they want us to move ahead.”

The team knows where it needs to go from here.

“City Council agreed that we really need to do is move forward with whatever needs to be done to get the permitting started,” Leggitt said, “and that’s the right thing to do because it takes awhile. They suggested that we get started on it right away.”

Gathering the proper permits can take a year or longer. Permit gathering for the team has been delegated to Gary Lacey, who has more than 30 years of civil engineering experience.

“When we move forward with the federal permitting process engineering documentation has to be submitted, all the rock work has to be engineered and submitted,” Leggitt said. “Any work that touches the water has to be processed.”

Working in conjunction with the city, the team is also looking to secure outside sources of money for the project.

“The city manager is looking into grants, so this is not all on the city,” Barnes said. “She has an awareness of some funding on a national level, and this could be a showcase for it.”

Once all the proper permits are lined up and funding is secured, the team can then break ground at the park. As of right now, there are a couple of areas of high priority.

“The first piece that we wanted to get done was the improvements to the boat ramp,” Leggitt said. “There are several improvements that need to be made, and all of the problems there can be solved.”

They also believe that the island has a lot of potential. They want to restore the island to make it another area for park visitors to explore. The team has a resourceful way to do this.

“The idea is to take all of that leftover stone that is going to be a byproduct of the bridge construction,” Leggitt said, “and put it where it needs to be and to build up the island so that it will never be underwater again.”

The team also hopes to improve bathroom facilities, the picnic area and the walkways all along the shoreline.

Breaking ground on the park is still a long way off. Depending on how the permitting process goes, work could start at the end of next summer, but it is more likely to start during the low water season in 2018.

Whether work starts sooner or later, the shoreline improvement team has a simple and attainable goal in mind, according to Barnes.

“We want people to be able to use the park in a way they haven’t since it’s been opened.”


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