Several officials, including Congressman Glenn Thompson, visited Clarion on Thursday and were updated on two projects – the Blue Print Community’s Second Avenue Recreational Park and the GlassWorks Industrial Park.
Theron Miles said the three-acre site on Second Avenue had once been a PennDOT facility 20 years ago. That facility was razed and the empty lot was used as a construction “lay down” area.
“It was a piece of property looking for a project,” Miles said. “Our community needed a playground. If kids wanted to play basketball they had to find a driveway with a hoop.”
Miles said this project was not just the dream of the Blue Print Community but one embraced by the community.
“This is an area that 6,000 people in our community can walk to,” he said.
“We also wanted this park to be an outdoor facility in the winter,” he said. He noted an area on the sketch of the park that could be used as an ice hockey area and an ice skating rink.
Miles said half the park will be green areas where people can utilize Wi-Fi service or attend classes outside.
He detailed the three phases of the project. The initial phase would include engineering, environmental concerns and earth moving, and the Clarion-based EADS Group would be doing the engineering work, Miles said.
The site work should be finished in the summer of 2021, he said.
Phase two will include the construction of basketball courts, and phase three will include the construction of the “centerpiece” of the project, the splash park.
Miles said the park will also include an area for concerts and a farmers market.
He said the estimated cost of the park project will be $3.4 million.
“We have already secured the match for grants we are pursuing,” he said.
“This is not a dream,” said Blue Print Community member Eric Funk. “This is fully in motion.”
The second part of the program was a closed-door session on the progress of the Miles Brothers Glassworks Business Park.