New Prospect Park Path Has Officials Excited

Greg Johnson said he hopes a new stretch of paved pathway that will be installed at Prospect Park in the coming months will catch the community's attention. 

"Our overriding goal is to bring people back to the parks and park district," the Clarendon Hills Park District board president said. "This is a great way—winter, spring, summer, fall—that people can use it."

The new stretch of 10-foot-wide walking path will run down the west side of the park, along Oxford Avenue, before heading east behind the ponds and then north back up to the Community Center and Clarendon Hills Middle School (CHMS).

See drawings of the proposed path here on the park district's website.

The new path is nearly a mile long, park district executive director Don Scheltens said, and will add a new dimension to the park. 

"It makes the park accessible to people who couldn’t make it out to the middle of the park before," Scheltens said.

The path will be wide enough for two-way walking, jogging and biking. It won't affect the setup of the park's athletic fields, and can also be used by CHMS students during gym class.

"The best thing is," Scheltens said, "we’re getting a grant for about 75 percent of it."

That grant, from the federal Recreation Trails Program, was received by the park district last fall. Scheltens said the grant is for $150,000 and the total cost of the path is expected to be $200,000 to $225,000. 

Installation of the path is expected to take place in May or June and will likely take two to three weeks to complete, Scheltens said.

Four new tennis courts and a new basketball court are being installed at Prospect Park this spring.