Awarded $600,000 grant, Crystal Lake Park District to break ground on new park this fall

Work on a new park on Haligus Road in Lakewood could begin this fall, thanks in part to a $600,000 state grant.

As part of a program administered by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, the Open Space Land Acquisition and Development, or OSLAD, grant will help supplement the cost of the more than $4 million Crystal Lake Park District project.

The 10-acre park – expected to feature pickleball courts, a splash pad and playground, a demonstration garden, a shelter, restrooms, a walking path, a soccer field, a basketball court and paved parking – will be the first the district has built in more than two decades, Executive Director Jason Herbster said.

And it’s needed, he said.

“That area of the park district is what we would call an underserved area,” he said. “There’s not a whole lot as far as parks and playgrounds there. It’s really just enhancing our services in that area. We want to get going as quickly as we can.”

The village of Lakewood donated the land to the park district for the development of the community park, to be located just south of the Lakewood Public Works facility on Haligus Road. The district worked with Hitchcock Design to develop the master plan for the park site.

Several community meetings were held to review the plan and receive input, Herbster said, and more are planned to dive deeper in final design for the splash pad and playground features.

“We’ll have probably at least one, if not two, community input meetings to nail down the exact amenities residents want in a park,” he said.

Although they could change, he said, current plans call for the park to be “nature-themed” to highlight the area’s pastoral setting. Park officials have talked of transforming a silo into a painted lookout tower. And the playground structures could be created at ground level, such as a slide built into a berm instead of above ground with a ladder, Herbster said.

“We’re excited to get going on the project and get some final feedback from the community and get a shovel in the ground,” he said.

The district’s project was among 118 park projects throughout Illinois awarded nearly $60 million in Open Space Land Acquisition and Development grants.

The grants represent the largest round of OSLAD grants in the 36-year history of the program, designed to help communities fund land acquisition and development for parks and outdoor recreation projects, according to a news release from the governor’s office.

As part of the OSLAD program, the park district must match the grant amount. The park board issued debt to be paid off over time to cover the remaining cost of the park project, Herbster said.