WOODLEAF — Rowan County Parks and Recreation wants to make a splash.

The parks department held a community park review, informing residents about plans for the Woodleaf Community Park. Rowan County Parks and Recreation Director Don Bringle showed the plans to a group of over 20. Many of them live near where the potential park will be built and want to see the project completed.

The park will be constructed where the former Woodleaf Elementary School was located. The school was closed in 2017 and demolished in 2019. But not all of the school will be erased from the location’s memory: the school’s stone marker, which reads “Woodleaf Elementary School,” will be incorporated into the park to pay homage.

The total budget for the park is a little over $1 million. The parks department put up $354,346 in funds for the park, which was matched by the Parks and Recreation Trust Fund, a statewide grant that awards funds to local governments for parks.

The parks features will include:

• Two playgrounds, one for toddlers and one for older children

• Two picnic shelters

• Multi-use field

• Outdoor exercise area

• Memorial orchard

• Gazebo

•  Amphitheater plaza

• 1.2 mile-walking trail that loops around the park

• Two parking lots

• Restroom facilities

Another feature is a possibility: a splash pad.

This feature is yet to be decided on and was only included in the design because an anonymous donor is willing to put up the money to include it in the park. The parks department is still unsure whether or not they can find additional money to build the pad, but went ahead and debuted the plans for what kind of splash pad could potentially be built.

“We’re excited about this opportunity here to put a splash pad in there, especially for the youth and all in this area,” Bringle said. “I’m glad we’ve got the donor that has stepped up, and we can make it bigger and better if we can get some additional funding.”

The splash pad would offer an area where kids can play with water devices like sprays, nozzles, waterfalls and water cannons. With no standing water, there is no need for a lifeguard.

Two types of splash pads are among the options: The “basic design” will cost $175,000 and includes eight water nozzles, ground sprays and a water loop. The “fully-equipped design” will have even more features, including jelly sticks, a large turtle, a rain curtain, a water mushroom, water cannons and water buckets.

“We’re going to have a lot of nice amenities” said Rowan County Commissioner Jim Greene, who has been a strong advocate for building the park. “We would not have been able to put a splash pad on here if somebody hadn’t been generous enough to do that for us, so we are awfully lucky.”

To produce the water for the splash pad, the parks department would have to drill a well and include a 1,700-gallon tank that would circulate and recycle the water. The tank would fill back up when the splash pad isn’t in use and would produce the water only when someone started using the splash pad.

The parks department hired Benesch, a Charlotte-based engineering firm, to produce designs and oversee the construction of the park. The firm has built other projects like Village Park and Veterans Park in Kannapolis, Yadkin River Park in Davidson County and various improvements in Cabarrus County Parks

Jeff Ashbaugh, senior project manager at Benesch, presented the plans, showing the group where the features would be included and what a potential timeline could be. Ashbaugh said it was too early to tell when opening day would be for the community park, but said he was hoping the park will be up for construction bids by January 2023. But there are a lot of factors that could delay that date, Ashbaugh said, including finishing up the final designs and applying for permits. If all goes well, construction could start as soon as Spring 2023, Ashbaugh said.

The park will be maintained by a part-time staff to start, but once it’s up and running, the parks department will increase that number depending on how much the park is used.

“Most of the community is ready for something to be done,” said Rene Atwell, a native of Woodleaf who was in attendance at the park review. “You aren’t going to please everyone, you know that, but forward progress will excite everybody.”