The 155-acre former Park Hill Golf Course will open to the general public for restricted park use beginning Oct. 28 after Denver formally acquired the land earlier this month.
Mayor Mike Johnston first introduced that town would purchase the land in January after his administration got here to an settlement with the property’s proprietor, Westside Funding Companions. Below the deal, officers agreed to swap a city-owned parcel close to Denver Worldwide Airport in change for the previous golf course.
Johnston celebrated the beginning of public entry in a information launch Thursday morning.
“We welcome Denver to see this park not for what it’s right this moment however what it may be,” Johnston mentioned within the launch. “For years, we now have heard from the group about not solely what this land means to Northeast Denver, however the worth it brings to our whole metropolis. Our work will proceed till the park, and each enchancment that comes with it, displays the desires and wishes of a neighborhood that has fought tirelessly for at the present time to return.”
On the time of the land-swap announcement, Johnston mentioned town deliberate to open entry to the park throughout the summer time. However the sophisticated deal took longer to conclude than anticipated.
The park, which nonetheless wants “intensive renovations,” together with lighting, can be open solely throughout daytime, the discharge says. Parkgoers can be restricted to passive use of the park, together with strolling and jogging, in keeping with town’s announcement.
The property would obtain $70 million price of enhancements if voters approve the Vibrant Denver bond bundle on November’s poll. Denver Parks and Recreation officers are nonetheless deciding which options and facilities they’ll assemble on the park.
The property has lengthy been a supply of stress amongst Denverites, a few of whom needed to see the land — one of many final plots of undeveloped land within the metropolis — partially developed with housing. Others pushed to maintain it as open house.
Westside bought the property for $24 million in 2019 and meant to develop it, incorporating a park with some housing and different makes use of, however voters handily rejected that plan in 2023. It has been closed to the general public ever since.
The previous golf course is about to turn out to be town’s fourth-largest park.
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