Thousands of people turned out on a sunny Saturday morning to enjoy everything that Gainesville’s newest park has to offer — and there’s a little something for everyone!
The opening of Depot Park in downtown Gainesville is a life-changing event for Aretha Carter. The resident of the adjacent Springhill neighborhood now has a safe place to take her children — and to breathe a little easier.
“This is my third time here!” said Carter while pushing her 2-year-old son, Tyreque, on one of the modern new swing sets in the city’s newest and largest public park. “I love that it’s right here in our neighborhood.”
Within eyesight was Carter’s 10-year-old daughter, Tomasia, playing on a huge piece of playground equipment that resembles a locomotive. She and hundreds of other children were frolicking around the Adventure Play Area on Saturday morning during Depot Park’s grand-opening celebration.
The 32-acre park off South Main Street and Depot Avenue began welcoming visitors on Aug. 1, but Saturday’s festivities allowed city officials to showcase Depot Park in all its glory. More than 3,000 people enjoyed live entertainment, family activities, food trucks and much more on a sun-splashed day.
“This day has been a long time coming,” said Cindi Harvey, project manager for the Gainesville Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA), which spearheaded the project. “The citizens of Gainesville have waited two decades for this to come to fruition. It took a village to build this park and, look, we’ve done it!”
There’s little doubt that the most popular feature of Depot Park is the 37,000-square-foot Adventure Play Area that features the Blue Grotto Splash Pad. The wet area’s design was inspired by the natural limerock and springs common in North Central Florida. Children can enjoy waterfalls, sprays and cannons.
Jessica Drouillard of Gainesville brought her 4-year-old daughter, Claire, to the splash pad to cool off.
“It’s gorgeous!” she said. “It’s much bigger than I expected.”
Drouillard wanted to thank park planners for considering parents by providing them shaded areas to sit and watch their children.
“They did a really good job, and it’s really awesome to see the number of kids here. You can tell it’s something that was really needed,” she said.
That kind of positive feedback is music to the ears of Josh Blackford, project manager for Oelrich Construction, which built the final phase of Depot Park.
“We’ve been waiting for this moment for two-and-a-half years,” Blackford said. “We’re just so happy that people can finally enjoy it and watch the dream happen.”
Blackford pointed out that it was not long ago when the land on which Depot Park rests was once saturated with coal-tar residue from a manufactured gas plant that once sat on the site. More than 147,000 tons of the bad soil had to be removed before construction could begin on the park itself.
“I grew up in Gainesville, and this was always a contaminated site,” he said. “To take this from a worthless piece of land to the most valuable in the city is a good feeling. It shows what we can do when we work together.”
There are numerous custom elements of Depot Park that reflect Gainesville’s history and ecology. For example, there are horseshoes embedded in portions of the promenade, similar to some downtown streets.
In the Adventure Play Area, a miniature brick stack mimics one that once stood across the street at the Kelly Power Plant. Some of the benches in the play area are even made of red brick from that old stack.
Harvey, from the CRA, said that any child who visits Depot Park today is going to remember being there when they are older.
“There’s one piece of playground equipment you always remember from when you were young,” she said. “Every piece of equipment here tells a story.”
Aretha Carter liked the fact that the entire playground has a fence around it so that Tyreque can’t wander off.
“It’s all gated in,” she said. “Even if he disappears, I can find him.”
Other playground elements represent a Timicua Village (cozy domes), an oak tree climber, a power-line climber, an owl totem pole and storm-water pipes — all for the fun of it. Also, the Florida Museum of Natural History provided fossils and other items from its collection that were incorporated into the Depot Park sandbox and splash-pad limerock.
“So much thought and love was poured into this,” said Nathalie McCrate, marketing coordinator for Oelrich Construction. She worked in a similar capacity for the CRA for much of Depot Park’s final construction phase.
“It’s been two decades of planning. I like to think of the park’s history as a layer cake. Each project manager and citizen contributed very meaningful details,” she said.
McCrate added that the grand opening is a mere blank canvas for everything to follow at Depot Park. The Cade Museum for Creativity and Invention is under construction on the west side of the park and should be completed by the end of next year. There are also talks of building an amphitheater as well as an art and sculpture garden behind the historic train depot.
Meanwhile, Saturday was also the opening day for the Pop-a-Top general store at the east end of the depot. Park visitors can stock up on a variety of ready-made foods, cold beverages and snacks every day from 8 a.m.-8 p.m. (except Mondays).
Russell Etling, Cultural Affairs Manager for the City of Gainesville, said that his department is now in charge of the day-to-day management of Depot Park. A schedule of events this fall will include DJs on Friday nights, live bands on Saturday nights and hands-on children’s activities every Sunday afternoon.
“Depot Park is a product of years of work, hundreds of people and dozens of organizations contributing to make it a reality,” Etling said. “We couldn’t be happier to see how well received it’s been by our citizens.”
Michelle Park, assistant director for the Department of Parks, Recreation and Cultural Affairs, added: “We’re so proud to be managing Gainesville’s Central Park. It’s the gem of our parks system. It’s a place for all citizens to come and hang out.”
Aretha Carter likes that idea. Then she remembered that her son, Tyreque, turns 3 next month.
“I think we just might have his birthday party right here,” she said.
— Noel Leroux
For the latest info, visit the Depot Park website.
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