Fort Wayne’s riverfront park work progressing well, moving into additional projects

By Kevin Kilbane | News-Sentinel

Riverfront park construction is progressing well and ready to expand into new phases, the Fort Wayne Parks and Recreation Department’s board of park commissioners learned during their meeting Thursday in Citizens Square.

They also approved paving and futsal projects in other parks.

Steve McDaniel, the parks department’s deputy director of asset management, provided the following updates on construction of Promenade Park, which is being built on the north and south banks of the St. Marys River between the Historic Wells Street Bridge and Harrison Street. The park is the first phase of city riverfront development efforts:

• Construction workers have about another week of steel beam installation to complete on the Fort Wayne Park Foundation Pavilion in the south side of the park. They then will start putting on the roof and constructing interior walls.
• The parks department has always planned to allow rental of the pavilion, but the department now will be exploring additional revenue-generation opportunities through concession operations.
• The 500-ton, historic, red brick building that once stood on the park site has been moved, allowing the space it once occupied to become a staging area for construction of docks on the north and south banks of the river and the foundations for the Tree Canopy Trail on the north bank.  This construction will require installing steel piling sheets along the river’s edge on both banks so the bank can be excavated behind them. Pilings for the docks will have to go down 25 feet into the ground. The work is expected to take about five months.
• Construction also will start this spring on the foundation for the band shell on the south side of Promenade Park. Work on the foundation should be completed by late spring or early summer.

Paul Spoelhof, a senior planner with the city’s Community Development Department, also updated park board members on the city’s request for a consultant to help create and implement a master plan for public and private development downtown along the St. Marys River.