Brook Run Needs Athletic Fields, Local Group Says

A group of Dunwoody residents are pushing back against a change in the city’s parks plan, that redraws the Brook Run Park blueprints to take out three baseball fields and replaces them with green space.

Pete Yost and Jared Elliot are among a group of parents who are urging others who’d like to see ball fields at Brook Run Park to show up at Monday night’s Dunwoody City Council meeting.

“It would be a real shame to have 102 acres and not have any space for the kids,” said Yost. “The rest of the whole park can be for grown ups, the dogs and the little kids.”

The original plan, which Yost supports, puts three baseball fields on 7.7 acres of land in the southwest corner of the park and brings in football and soccer fields in through an joint use agreement with Peachtree Charter Middle School.

However, that plan has come up against strong opposition from neighbors, who have been raising their concern with the plan at the last few city council meetings.

Residents in the adjacent neighborhood have voiced concerns that runoff the ball fields would increase the heavy flooding that already hits the area after hard rains and would increase noise, traffic and add light pollution.

“We do not believe there is room for three fields to be placed in Brook Run,” Frank Lockridge, with the Lakeview Oaks Homeowners Association, said at a council meeting in May. “We think you’d be adversely affecting our quality of life.”

Ken Langley, who maintains Dunwoody Senior Baseball’s fields and worked in the past for civil engineering companies, said he doesn’t believe ball fields would increase flooding and said the city would be bound by law to keep the runoff levels at the current level because of the creek nearby.

Langley, who now works as a lighting engineer, said lighting shouldn’t be an issue for neighbors.

“I doubt there would be any measurable light beyond the property line,” he said.

There have also been concerns raised that several old trees would be taken out to make room for the fields.

Councilwoman Adrian Bonser that would put the ball fields on a to a yet-to-be-purchased piece of property, which would be dedicated to athletics.

Bonser said she came to the conclusion after looking at the issues raised by the initial proposal.

“I did a list of pros and cons on this plan, and the cons far outweigh the pros,” she said before the council’s second meeting in May.

Elliot said he was surprised by the change.

“I liked the plan. I think it made a lot of sense,” he said. “We would gain one more field, plus there was in the design, maybe a possibility we could get some more fields, soccer, football and another baseball field if we worked a deal out with the middle school. I thought that made a heck of a lot of sense there too.”

Yost thinks the new plan lacks financial sense.

“We think it is fiscally irresponsible to acquire a property to be athletic fields on when we already have a space tucked into the back of Brook Run,” he said. “Why should the citizens of Dunwoody be asked to take on a financial burden that’s not necessary.”

He also thinks that people are going to fight fields going in anywhere they go.

“These same concerns will come up anywhere we go,” Yost said. But he also pointed out that the residents around Dunwoody Park, where the fields are currently, don’t want to see the ball fields go – as they are more concerned about noise from playgrounds than the current baseball fields.

Yost and his group have started an online petition to put the ball fields in Brook Run.

Overall, Dunwoody is lacking in park space. According to a survey from Lose & Associates, the firm hired to come up with the city’s overall parks plan, the city has about four acres per 1,000 residents and three ball fields.

The two ball fields at Dunwoody Park, which host 500 games per year for Dunwoody Senior Baseball, are a little tired.

Yost said there is definitely a need for more fields.

What the National Recreation and Parks Association recommends is 10.5 acres of parkland per 1,000 residents and 16 baseball and softball fields based on current population. Currently, the city has about 4 acres per 1,000 residents and 3 ball fields.

Lose set the city’s goals at having 5.5 acres of parkland and 16 baseball/softball fields, along with four fields for football and four for soccer/multi-use.

Langley said the group is speaking up because he feels that kids who play sports haven’t been represented in this discussion.

“It’s not like we are looking for a place for our kids to play,” said Langley, pointing out that he, Yost and Elliot’s children are now playing in leagues that don’t use the fields. “We’re really looking at the future of the kids who are following them.”