LONG BRANCH – Plans for a city park in the downtown Broadway area could be moving forward as soon as this month.
At the Long Branch workshop meeting Nov. 7, Richard E. Brown of Birdsall Engineering Inc. recommended that the council award a contract at the end of the month for the Broadway Park project.
“Our recommendation is that a bid be awarded at the Nov. 27 council meeting,” Brown, the project engineer, said after the meeting.
“I am not confident that if we reject it this time [the next bid] won’t go higher,” he said.
Brown added, “If [the city] awards the contract this month, construction on the project could probably start midspring,” he added.
Brown presented plans at the workshop meeting, which call for Broadway Park to be constructed on an open tract of land adjacent to the parking lot behind Brookdale Community College on Broadway, according to Brown.
The park is planned to be located between Third and Union avenues and will include a band-shell concert area, paved walkways and a tower clock, according to Brown.
“This park has been called the Broadway Park even though there is no frontage on Broadway,” Brown said. “I don’t know if [the city] will change the name.”
Brown explained that the design calls for a band shell to be constructed at the site, which is a stage encompassed by a shell-type structure with an opening in the front in order to project sound and create an amphitheater effect.
The band shell is to be constructed at the southeast corner of the property at grade level, he said, adding that a sitting area has been designed to front the stage.
The sitting area will slope upward away from the stage in order to offer a view of the stage from all seats, according to Brown.
Brown recommended that council vote at its next meeting Nov. 27 to approve a bid of $257,765 for the project from “apparent low bidder” Down to Earth Landscaping of Jackson.
The project was originally sent out for bid in 2005, but all bids came in too high, according to Brown.
Some modifications were made to the original 2005 design, including constructing the band shell at grade level rather than as an elevated structure, according to Brown.
In August, the city re-bid the project with the changes, and Down to Earth Landscaping was one of two companies to submit bids, Brown said.
“We’ve waited a long time [for the park],” Councilwoman Mary Jane Celli said at the workshop meeting after the presentation.