The public will have a new park to explore this weekend on Tacoma’s West End.
For nine months, workers have been expanding the 10-acre Kandle Park near North 26th and Shirley streets. It now includes a playground designed for children with physical disabilities, three skate dots and a sprayground.
“It’s exciting,” Metro Parks’ project manager Curtis Hancock said about the park’s opening. “We’re all looking forward to seeing it getting used in full.”
The chain link fence surrounding the park will come down Saturday and residents will be free to roam the area.
The park also will have Pierce County’s first wave pool, which will feature four 25-meter lap lanes intended to replace the competition pool at Titlow Park. The new pool will not open until summer.
Construction on the park began in March but was delayed several months by bad weather. Metro Parks had hoped to have most features open by August.
Last week, the main pool was filled with 150,000 gallons of water. The toddler pool, which is 11 inches deep, took 8,500 gallons.
This week, workers are doing final inspections, laying sod and adding a temporary gravel path to one of the skate dots.
Lisa Duval plans to bring her children to Kandle Park for the Saturday opening.
“That park has definitely needed a fresh look for a long time,” said Duval, a member of the park’s steering committee. “What’s really exciting is this has gone beyond anything anybody could have hoped for the park.”
Even after this weekend’s opening, there will still be work to be done at Kandle, which stayed within its $7.5 million budget.
The overflow parking lot isn’t complete and grades in the community garden must be raised to dispose of excess soil. Guardrails and shades haven’t yet been installed on the back end of the main pool.
But people can shoot hoops on the newly paved basketball court and can walk the 1,315-foot cement loop around freshly planted grass and trees.
Children can test out the rubber-padded 8,400-square-foot play area that features cherished favorites like slides and swings and modern playthings like a moving circle that children can run atop.
There’s also fake boulders with a tightrope walk.
“I think this (park) will be a crown jewel,” Hancock said.
Stacia Glenn: 253-597-8653 stacia.glenn@thenewstribune.com
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