DCNR open house to focus on Ryerson Park
The state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources will host an open house at Ryerson Station State Park’s office next week to publicly discuss some of the preliminary plans in store for the park.
The meeting will run from 5 to 8:30 p.m., Tuesday, May 17, during which DCNR staff will discuss and answer questions about the park’s progress so far. DCNR has been working with the Re-Vision Ryerson Station State Park Task Force, made up of community members, to brainstorm for possible features that could be a part of the park’s redesign.
“It’s going to be a basic general informational meeting,” park manager Alan Johnson said. “We will be just discussing where we’re at right now, how we got there and discussing the concept plan. We’re not at the point right now where we would show anyone a design or anything like that.”
The park is expected to undergo major renovations in the coming years following a $36 million settlement with Consol Energy reached in 2013. The state contends longwall mining near the park damaged the dam at Duke Lake and forced officials to drain the lake in 2005.
The money was initially supposed to be used to rebuild the dam and lake, and the state spent nearly $10 million of the settlement for lake sediment removal and for the initial redesign of the dam. However, the DCNR announced last July it could not rebuild the dam because of continued ground movement near the park.
Johnson said during a meeting last month that some of the new park features could include a new pool complex, modernized campgrounds, additional cabins, a paved bike trail, a boardwalk, a playground and an improved amphitheater. He said most of the ideas stemmed from surveys that were sent out to residents to find out what they’d want to in the park.
When asked if the meeting would reveal what, if any, of those plans have been finalized or what the individual costs would be, Johnson said it was too early to tell
“We’re not even close to being at that point yet,” he said. “Throughout this we’ve had several taskforces and this is the second or third public meeting we’ve had so that we can keep people in the loop.”