Residents and officials are looking forward to the new park’s completion in 2013. – Photo by Harry Kane

By Harry Kane

A new half-acre park will be built at 15-25 Cross St. in East Somerville. A $500,000 PARC grant was awarded on Jan. 17 to renovate a derelict parking lot behind the Senior Center.

City officials aim to open the park in the summer of 2013. Since 2003 the community has been advocating for the revamping of the original Harris Park, located by Interstate-93.

Community meetings have rallied Somerville residents behind the project and after almost a decade of discussion, the new park is slated for construction based off recent conceptual designs put forward by Ground View Design, a Somerville-based landscape architecture and urban design company.

Two concept plans were put forward for debate: a mountain concept and forest concept.

After community input a refined design utilizing the mountain concept became the choice of the people. An overwhelming 75 percent of the community members preferred the mountain concept, said Eden Dutcher of Ground View Design.

The functional and imaginative recreational play area with an array of fun and innovative universal design features for people of all ages is in the final stages of planning.

An 8-foot tall slide, climbing elements, and a community garden amphitheater are just a few of the urban design elements that will be modernizing the new park.

For toddlers a proposed customized playhouse containing movable parts pays tribute to the Ford Plant that used to exist in Assembly Square.

The whole park will be filled with canopy trees to give shade to the kids while they play: American Sweet Gum, Tupelo, Red Maple, Scarlet Oak, and Swamp White Oak.

There may also be ornamental trees such as Serviceberry and Hawthorn. The park’s edge will contain more vegetation including Pyramidal Hornbeam, Hinoki Cypress and Virginia Creeper.

The park’s lighting scheme has been thoroughly planned out by Lukus Sturm of Ripman Lighting. “My job is to create a safe environment through the nighttime and to extend use of park after hours, so it’s not just a space you use for sunrise to sunset. Sturm’s philosophy is to “light what you want to see and light it low.”

A lot of youth input was accepted during this process, especially from those at Teen Empowerment. There’s still time to add your input, and one of the teens at the last meeting did so. Jean-Louis Guerschom, 14, felt that there needed to be a tire swing at the park. “They stand in line to use the tire swings,” he said when referring to his classmates.