Allegheny County, Pennsylvania's Bethel Park Breaks Ground on 3 Playgrounds
Bethel Park officials in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, broke ground on three different playground projects at its municipal parks.
The first is Birch Tree Park on Sept. 24, reported The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
The playground equipment was selected by area residents and will be in compliance with current playground safety standards, which includes storm sewer work.
“Local flooding is a major issue facing many municipalities in the Pittsburgh area,” said Bethel Park director of engineering Stacey Graf, reported The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “After the flood of 2018, council made a commitment to complete Flood Control Mitigation Projects throughout the municipality on public property. In this neighborhood, Glenrock and Ashland received major road damage in 2018 due to the large volume of water coming through the valley, as well as many residents with reported flooding.”
This storm sewer project cost $265,000 and was completed by Morgan Excavating.
The next project that broke ground on Oct. 1 is the Oak Tree Park’s playground installation.
According to Bethel Park council president Tim Moury, the team is upgrading the playground equipment and pavilion and including storm water management.
The park is being moved from its old site due to the location of the new underground tanks installed to collect stream water drainage. Additionally, the old pavilion was removed to make space for a larger playground space.
The new playground equipment will accommodate both younger and older children. After the playground is complete, work will be done on sidewalks near the park. Reported The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
In 2020, the municipality also completed an approximate $400,000 storm water project for the park to alleviate flooding conditions.
Work consisted of installing a diversion structure to intercept and move flow from Summit Street storm sewers to a new underground detention tank field, reported The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. This tank field collects runoff from 3.5 acres of upstream drainage and can hold about 116,000 gallons of water. Additionally, two new rain gardens to hold back 71,000 gallons of water were installed, as well as french drains around the baseball field to collect water.
The project was also completed in 2020 by Morgan Excavating.
Lastly, on Oct. 15, work at Millennium Park began, reported The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
Upgrades to the park include a new playground, new walking trail, updated ADA compliant restrooms, a concession stand and the municipality’s first synthetic turf baseball field.
Other improvements will include multiple pitching and base distances allowing for a variety of age groups involved in softball and baseball to play, and previously installed underground tanks adjacent to the new field area to hold about 49,000 gallons of storm water.
The total project cost is $975,000, which is partially funded by a grant from the Land & Water Conservation Fund through Pennsylvania DCNR for $268,300, reported The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.