Gwinnett County now has a new master plan for parks and recreation, and the community said they felt like the parks are a vital part of the county.
Community Development officials said they learned a lot from the over 40,000 points of data provided by the community during outreach events, including that they wanted to see parks more as an essential service.
"During the COVID-19 pandemic, we found our parks being used on a much broader and much heavier scale day to day, whereas our heaviest usage times would typically be in the evenings and on weekends," said Deputy Director for Gwinnett County Community Development Mark A. Patterson. "Pretty much any given time, on any given day of the week we had a lot of people using our parks, and they used them as not only an emotional but a physical outlet to get away from some of the troubles that were going on that we were all dealing with."
Another key element in the results was that people wanted to access the park experience close to home. "By not necessarily using a vehicle, by using trails and sidewalks, and having that multi-modal capability to address their needs and their wants to get to these experiences is very important," Patterson said.
The master plan encompasses the next ten years of projects for the county, according to Patterson, and as the plan was recently approved by the Board of Commissioners, the next step is capital improvement phase.
"That is where we identify, based upon this plan, working with the recreation authority board, a list of strategic programs that fit the needs and fit the gaps that were identified in some of the data collection," said Patterson. "As well as those desires the community has really presented to us"
As funding becomes available, some of those projects include renovation, park improvements and new parks, as well as adding more playgrounds, dog parks, water features, outdoor courts, and trails.
The parks capital projects have primarily been funded through Special Purpose Local Option Sales tax revenues, according to a release from the county.
