Recreation plan calls for more sports space, facilities in Fairhope

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FAIRHOPE – More land and money will be needed for recreation activities as Fairhope continues to grow and the demand for sports space increases, members of the city Recreation Board told the City Council.

The board presented a draft of a five-year plan to the council at its April 22 work session.

Recreation Board Member Bob Keyser said the top priority for Fairhope is land to meet growing demands as the city’s population increases.

“Recreation space continues to be at a premium,” he said. “Football, baseball, disc golf, and soccer continue to be pressed for space to practice and play while flag football and lacrosse are beginning to gain interest and will need space in the immediate future.”

He said the second priority is to complete and engineering study of Volanta Park. Youth baseball participation has exceeded the facility’s capacity. Other needs, however, such as parking, disc golf and the dog park, limit from the space available for expansion.

Moving some baseball activities to other sites could also create problems for families, he said.

“One of the challenges you’ve got at Volanta, is that you’ve got so much going on there,” Keyser said. “In addition to packing in all the baseball, if you start splitting the leagues, is a family that now has kids in multiple leagues in multiple locations, if you drop the kids here and drop the other ones off and then go back.”

Mayor Karin Wilson said she and city officials have been looking at recreation plans since she took office more than two years ago. She said Fairhope needs to start looking at what will be needed 10 or 15 years in the future and make plans to meet those demands.

“Baseball softball are the fastest growing sports and as the fastest growing community, we already know that we already know that we’ve outgrown Volanta,” she said. “It’s not that we’re going to get rid of anything, but we do have to think about the bigger picture and that’s when I told them we need to look for land.”

Council President Jack Burrell said the city needs to look at expanding recreational opportunities. The city, however, should look at how to best use money and space to serve the most people.

He questioned some of the recommended priorities in the plan, such as expanding disc golf if many of the people using the existing facility are from outside Fairhope.

He also said a diving well in a proposed new Olympic sized swimming pool would be useful for school divers, but wondered how many other people would use it.

“It’s back to providing for school sports,” he said. “Is that really something we want to do? It has to be looked at and is the county willing to help us plus the school board if it’s benefitting school sports.”

Other priorities in the plan include, refurbishing the visitors’ concession stand at Majors Field, plans for the expansion of the municipal pool, improving the Founders Park Softball Complex and planning for Colony Park. The plan also calls for expanding the Barnwell concession stand and adding a new racquetball court at the Recreation Center.

Fairhope, City Council, recreation