City breaks ground on Interim King Street Park

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City breaks ground on Interim King Street Park
The former Old Dominion Boat Club site was demolished Tuesday, March 13 (Photo Credit: Denise Dunbar)
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By Alexa Epitropoulos | aepitropoulos@alextimes.com

City officials hosted a groundbreaking ceremony on Saturday morning for the soon-to-be Interim King Street Park on the waterfront.

The ceremony, attended by Mayor Allison Silberberg, City Manager Mark Jinks and all members of city council, followed the demolition of the former Old Dominion Boat Club last week.

The city and the Old Dominion Boat Club made a deal to swap land parcels in 2014 and the new Boat Club building opened to members at the foot of Duke Street in late January.

The new park, which will be constructed where the club building and the parking lot once were, is slated to include a river terrace, a flexible plaza, a lawn and a waterfront promenade. The space is scheduled to open in this fall and will be used as a flexible gathering space for daily use and for seasonal special activities, according to the city.

The park is envisioned as the centerpiece to the city’s Waterfront Small Area Plan, which calls for a network of pedestrian and bike paths to provide continuous waterfront access. City council approved the waterfront plan in 2012.

The construction of the interim park represents the first phase of the landscape and flood mitigation plan, which was approved in 2014 by city council.

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