New Park and Amenity Coming to Colliers Hill!
Initial planning has begun on a new seven-acre park and amenity in Colliers Hill, to be located just north of Flora View Drive near filing 4C (see diagram). Two community meetings have already been held with residents of Colliers Hill, the Town of Erie and Erie Parks and Recreation, with a third slated for late March or early April. Colliers Hill residents will have another opportunity to weigh in on features of the park, once a community-wide survey has been distributed to invite comments, questions and provide additional fodder for the meeting.
For the last five years, Landscape Architect Brad Haigh, Principal, Norris Design, has been working with developer Jerry Richmond of Raintree Investment Corporation, on the Colliers Hill community.
“They’ve developed a really exceptional community in Colliers Hill and we want this project to have a positive and successful impact on what is already great place to live,” Haigh says.
Two Facets, Lots of Options
Haigh revealed some of the progress made during the first two community meetings, attended largely by Colliers Hill homeowners.
“There are two facets to this project: the pool and amenity center and the neighborhood park,” Haigh says. “Rather than come with a blank slate, we presented two different concepts to give people something to react to.”
The first meeting, Haigh says, was “a big brain dump” that prompted residents to identify recreational features they felt were missing in Colliers Hill. In the second meeting, the team at Norris Design came up with a concept to fill in those blanks – with options.
An Egalitarian Dot-ocracy
“We did what we called a ‘dot-ocracy,’” he says. After handing out sticky dots, attendees voted for various features by placing dots on their preferences. For instance, they were offered choices between features like:
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- a sand volleyball pit, or an area where volleyball could be played in the grass;
- formal bocce ball courts, or an area to toss bocce balls;
- tennis, pickleball or basketball courts;
- if the latter, two basketball hoops, or a full court
“They could vote this way or that and it wouldn’t change the overall formal design, just the way the pieces fit together,” Haigh says.
Invited: Kids Who Speak Playground
The meetings have been held in an open-house format and in the most recent, a family that had researched parks and playgrounds played a starring role in pointing playground must-haves including big slides, swings and some of the more traditional play elements.
“There was some discussion about whether to have a 2-to-5-year-old play area separate from a 6-to-10-year-old play area, and we heard a lot about providing shade,” Haigh says.
Shade is something of a challenge in Colorado for start-up projects like these, Haigh notes, as trees here are fairly slow-growing. “But we’re discussing how to do a structure by the playground that could be used for community events, small concerts, maybe movies in the park, but still serve as the playground’s shade and seating area.”
The ETA is Still TBD
While construction on the park won’t begin for at least two years, Haigh urged residents to look for the upcoming park survey and provide input during these planning stages. The final meeting to discuss the park and amenity will be announced by the Colliers Hill HOA and is tentatively planned for late March or early April. A survey was distributed by the HOA PCMS on March 10 inviting residents to select their preferences for amenity options by March 20.
Also, on the drawing board is a smaller pocket park now being reviewed by the Town of Erie to be developed in the next couple of years. And within the next five years, look for planning to begin on a 40-acre park across from Erie High School, the future site of a wide variety of recreational facilities and sports and fields.
Looking Ahead to Colliers Hill
There’s always something wonderful happening in and around the master-planned community of Colliers Hill, from get-togethers and activities for adults and kids at the Overlook, or special events year-round in Erie. If you don’t live here yet, we invite you to tour this fast-growing community and explore the beautiful model homes from Meritage Homes, Richmond American Homes, and Century Communities and coming in 2020, KB Homes. The floor plans include ranch-style, two-story designs and paired homes — priced from the high $300s.
