Plans for new park shift into drive

A new 40-acre park in Lakewood Ranch should begin taking shape within a month.

Lakewood Ranch developer Schroeder-Manatee Ranch has approved a $1.18 million contract with Frederick Derr & Co. for construction of the park, located east of Lakewood Ranch Boulevard, west of White Eagle Boulevard and south of Gatewood Drive.

Project engineer Rob Engel of Stantec said site work is expected to start in about a month, and the initial contract with Frederick Derr & Co. provides a six-month window for completion of most of the amenities, including walking paths, stormwater mitigation and other infrastructure, a dog park and play fields.

“It’s more of a passive park,” Engel said of the project.

Manatee County Infrastructure and Strategic Planning official John Osborne said although many newer neighborhoods in Lakewood Ranch have private community amenities, this park will offer ballfields and other amenities for use communitywide, making it important to Manatee County’s overall parks and recreational offerings.

“Everywhere in the county, every time we build ball fields and soccer fields, they fill right up,” he said. “If you go to Lakewood Ranch High School (park) on any given weekend, it’s mobbed. Every park we have is maxed out. It gives another spot for leagues to reserve fields to play and practice.”

Manatee County Commissioner Vanessa Baugh, who represents the greater Lakewood Ranch area, commended SMR for fulfilling commitments to install infrastructure ahead of development. With more neighborhoods under development north of State Road 70, the park will be a destination.

“If we’re going to live, work and play here, we need parks,” she said. “It will be an asset like all the others. It shows we truly are a community in Lakewood Ranch. I’m glad it’s being built.”

Once finished, the new Lakewood Ranch park will include restrooms and a 1,456-square-foot pavilion, an all-purpose field, open play fields, a dog park, tot lots and walking trails.

The developer will consider a separate contract, at a later date, to build the park’s restrooms, playground and a pavilion, Engel said.

The park will open for public use likely in mid-2017, with future phases opening in 2018.

The park will be owned and operated by the Lakewood Ranch Stewardship District, a special taxing district that governs land owned by SMR in Sarasota and Manatee counties and is located outside Phase 1 development (Lakewood Ranch Country Club, Greenbrook, Summerfield and Riverwalk communities).