Wilmington celebrate $1M park expansion; Greenville Loop Rd. park plans advance

1 hour ago

Kamy Smelser,

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY-TV) – The city of Wilmington celebrated the completion of a major upgrade at a local park on Wednesday.

The celebration comes just days after county commissioners green lit a request to partner with the city and New Hanover Community Endowment for a new park on Greenville Loop Road.

“And it’s just great to see this come to fruition and to be finished finally,” said Mayor Bill Saffo.

The park underwent a more than $1 million expansion across 13 acres from pickleball courts to a multi-purpose field. Saffo said the partnership between the city and the county kept this area of green space alive.

“A couple years ago we preserved 90 acres of property that could have very well easily been developed,” Saffo said.

Now, the city and county are doing it again in partnership with the New Hanover Community Endowment.

“When we find those opportunities like we just did on Greenville Loop Road for 24 additional acres that will be right next to Bradley Creek Elementary School that will join their cross city trail, I think it’s great collaboration,” Saffo said.

County commissioners voted 3-2 on Monday to commit $1 million for the $9 million park. Commissioner Rob Zapple dissented and said he supports preserving green space but not the lack of transparency behind the purchase of the land from an LLC.

“Anytime we move public money in this case $9,750,000 from the public’s purse into a private entity, all I’ve asked for is, who are we writing the check to?” Zapple said.

Zapple said the purchasing price is four times the amount of the county’s tax appraisal on the land. Despite this pushback, plans are now moving forward on the new park and Saffo said the park’s specific features will be shaped by public input and environmental conditions.

“This is not just the city and the county determining what will be there it will be citizens ultimately that will tell us what they would really like to see there,” Saffo said.

Saffo said over the next 5 years they will be working on a master plan before beginning construction. The city aims to have a design consultant selected by the end of the 2026 calendar year.

“Once we determine what we want to put in the park it will take us some time to design the park which will take us about a year to do that and then of course appropriate the funding to make sure that it happens,” Saffo said.