My role: Owners Representative/ Landscape Architect and Project Manager

Agency: Kent County Parks, Michigan
Project Cost: Over $25 million
Funding Source: County General Fund, Michigan Department of Natural Resources Trust Fund, and the generous philanthropic support from countless community members who supported this development/redevelopment

Scope of Work

Millennium Park is a 1,500 acre park within the cities of Grand Rapids, Granville, Walker, and Wyoming. It is at the northern end of the Kent Trail and it spans 6 miles of Grand River waterfront. This is the largest regional park in Kent County and is commonly compared to Central Park in New York City as it is one of the largest urban parks in the united states. Regional support was necessary to make the vision of this park a reality. 

Image source: OCBA

When I joined the staff at Kent County, under the Director of Parks, the park had a master plan in place and phase one had just started construction. As project manager and owners representative, my role was to carry on the planning and design process to construct this legacy project. My management of approximately 50 consultants was necessary to due diligence on planning, researching and implementing this project. Some of this list included collaboration with geologists, oil and natural gas specialists, land reclamation specialists, hydrologists, agronomists, ecologists, historians, native/indigenous people, architects, landscape architects, engineers, horticulturalists, and an assortment of other related specialists. All of the construction trades were also part of my responsibility.

Phase one and two, which I was responsible for, included the development of the central core of the park as well as the planning for future phases of the project. This included the construction of a beach house building with 6 acre beach, splash pad, 2 playground areas, restroom building, 4 picnic shelters, water, sewer, gas, and electric utility installation, parking for 600 cars, all purpose trail, boat launch area, sand volleyball courts, basketball court, fishing decks, overlook decks and boardwalks, irrigation, and landscaping.

I served as the primary the point of contact for the project, and was responsible for presenting updates on the project to special interest groups for education, public relations, and stakeholders interested isupporting the park development with charitable contributions.

Unique Circumstances

Such of this unique property was once a sand and gravel quarry. The project was considered a restoration project, reclamation project, and renovation project. This area was littered with the remnants of abandoned oil and natural gas wells, many of which needed remediation in order to restore the land, water, and air to its proper state and ensure public safety. In addition to oil and gas, remediation was necessary for landfill parcels, gypsum plant property, and industrial parcels.

Kent County Parks received two acquisition grants and two development grants for Millennium Park from the Michigan Depart of Natural Resources. I spent many hours dealing with city, county, and state regulatory agencies to help coordinate this work and helped close out the grants.

Other challenges included:

• A completely new water service line needed to be permitted and installed from the 64 inch water mainline that feeds the city of Grand Rapids.

• Working on a project with 5 other governing jurisdictions presented excessive coordination.

• Working on a property with native/indigenous people burial grounds required active diligence to determine the level of service and possible interpretation of this sacred site.

• Working on a multi-discipline project with a short planning and construction timeline was monumental for its time.

Working on a park development project from the time I started in the position was incredibly rare. I was fortunate to have this opportunity. This will likely be one of my biggest professional accomplishments.