River Rouge Park in Detroit is getting the attention it needs

**Vic01** · April-06-14, 05:19 AM

here's some good news to break up the blah, blah, blah, nasty threads...

While the eyes of the state and city were on Belle Isle during a year long, contentious battle over improvements and ownership, Sally Petrella and state Rep. Harvey Santana watched with rising frustration as River Rouge Park, the city’s largest, sat ignored.

“People are so focused on Belle Isle,” Santana, D-Detroit,said last fall, “but here’s Rouge Park that is larger than Belle Isle, and people seem to forget about Rouge Park. We have swimming pools, horse stables. The promised potential of that park is just enormous. I understand Belle Isle, but what about Rouge Park?”
What indeed?

Santana, Petrella, president of Friends of Rouge Park, and a host of volunteers have been working on a master plan for the 1,100-acre green space that the city has owned on the west side for nearly a century. The park has an 18-hole golf course, 12 playgrounds, 14 baseball diamonds, 11 tennis courts and 200 picnic tables. Its sheer size makes it hard tomaintain, and many areas of the park appear overgrown or underdeveloped or seemingly abandoned.
But now, business and civic leaders have stepped up, and River Rouge Park is ignored no more. The Lear corporation is spending $2 million to renovate the park’s two Olympic-size pools, and Santana worked a deal in the Legislature to get $300,000 for operations staff, including lifeguards. The city also has turned its attention to Rouge, contributing $1.2 million to help renovate the bath house, recreation department director Alicia Minter said Friday.

more at

http://www.freep.com/article/2014040...rochelle-riley

**Pickford-Bentler** · April-06-14, 07:04 AM

Good news about the pools, indeed. My brother and I used to ride our bikes down Burt Road to what were then called the Rouge Pools. I loved jumping off of the diving platform.

As a side story, I knew a guy who lived by the park and he wanted to see what one of my model rockets with a D motor could do. So we set up in an open area of the park and let one go up. The next thing you know there were about thirty or forty kids wanting to see more. They would chase down my rocket and bring it back with big smiles on their faces. I suppose what I was doing was not legal, but all those happy laughing children left a nice memory of how things should be.

A line on the father's side of my family was part of the group that sold the land that became the park.

**Hypestyles** · April-07-14, 11:46 AM

good news- hopefully more city parks can get spruced up or even expanded as the land/blight reassessment takes place.

**DetroitPlanner** · April-07-14, 02:37 PM

Eliza Howell can be expanded to take over half of Brightmoor. Dammed shame most of the park is technically closed as it is.

**Smirnoff** · April-07-14, 03:58 PM

This is very good news, very.....back in the 1960's, we swam in the pools almost every day. Pony rides were available, you could also rent go-karts or in the winter take a toboggan ride. Honda 90's were also available to rent....

Dad told me about the annual Soap Box Derby held at Rouge Park, would love to see it return.....

**Lombaowski** · April-07-14, 07:38 PM

I grew up near Rouge park and spent many days of my childhood riding my bike down there to play baseball, or dragging my hockey stuff down there to play with the older kids. It was great in the 70s and early 80s, there was really nothing to worry about as far as crime and stuff. I got in a few fights, sure. Nothing serious though, it was just my neighborhood park [[I had it good compared to other kids). In the summer we used to go to the golf course at night and take all the golf balls in the woods around the greens, and sell them to the golfers the next day.

When crack rolled in and pretty much everyone started to leave it got progressively worse and we moved up north in 1986. I went back in 1992 or 1993, it was awful. Pools were closed, no one was on the baseball fields, open-air drug market, and no police presence at all [[I guess the mounted police only mounted on the weekend).

I've been back several times since and it is just overgrown, packs of stray dogs and cats, and people dumping stuff. Why would anyone dump anything in a park when the whole effing city is a dump zone? Just makes me sick.

This is good news and interest in the park would be good for everyone including the nearby suburbs which once used the park with great frequency. The last few times I haven't seen much nefarious activity, but there wasn't anyone in the park to sell drugs to I figured.

I read a lot on this forum about people who lost things in the old Detroit, a lot of stuff I never got to see as a child of the 70s and 80s. But I knew some of the greatness of Rouge Park, and it's decline is probably the one thing I most relate to when talking about things lost. The best thing is there is no reason the park can't come back, I figure it will someday and the park itself could revitalize my old stomping grounds. I can dream.

**Smirnoff** · April-08-14, 02:00 PM

To be honest....I thought the pools were totally beyond repair due to years of heat/cold cycles & neglect....I have my fingers crossed.

There was also a large R/C airplane club which flew scale planes on the weekends - we watched them takeoff/fly/land for hours.

**Smirnoff** · April-09-14, 06:07 PM

Originally Posted by Lombaowski

I grew up near Rouge park and spent many days of my childhood riding my bike down there to play baseball, or dragging my hockey stuff down there to play with the older kids. It was great in the 70s and early 80s, there was really nothing to worry about as far as crime and stuff. I got in a few fights, sure. Nothing serious though, it was just my neighborhood park [[I had it good compared to other kids). In the summer we used to go to the golf course at night and take all the golf balls in the woods around the greens, and sell them to the golfers the next day.

When crack rolled in and pretty much everyone started to leave it got progressively worse and we moved up north in 1986. I went back in 1992 or 1993, it was awful. Pools were closed, no one was on the baseball fields, open-air drug market, and no police presence at all [[I guess the mounted police only mounted on the weekend).

I've been back several times since and it is just overgrown, packs of stray dogs and cats, and people dumping stuff. Why would anyone dump anything in a park when the whole effing city is a dump zone? Just makes me sick.

This is good news and interest in the park would be good for everyone including the nearby suburbs which once used the park with great frequency. The last few times I haven't seen much nefarious activity, but there wasn't anyone in the park to sell drugs to I figured.

I read a lot on this forum about people who lost things in the old Detroit, a lot of stuff I never got to see as a child of the 70s and 80s. But I knew some of the greatness of Rouge Park, and it's decline is probably the one thing I most relate to when talking about things lost. The best thing is there is no reason the park can't come back, I figure it will someday and the park itself could revitalize my old stomping grounds. I can dream.

The 50/60's were very-very different than the 70/80's.....ask anyone from that era.

**royce** · April-22-14, 01:53 AM

The airplane club was flying planes as far back as ten years ago. I don't know if they still do it, but it was cool to watch those remote controlled planes zoom across the park.

**gazhekwe** · April-22-14, 08:51 AM

Airplane club was still flying quite recently, near the corner of Joy and Spinoza, I think. Rouge Park was the greatest thing for my brother and me when we moved back to Detroit in the mid-60s. We would ride our bikes there and go to the pool, or just ride around. It was so great to see the green spaces with lots of trees. We were pretty homesick for the UP. I also remember going to Day Camp in the park in the early 50s before we moved up north. That area is still there, surrounded by chain link, looks very usable for Day Camp with just a some clean up and yard maintenance. Also, when we married on the cusp of the 70s, DH and I used to spend a lot of time in the park, so peaceful and pretty. There was the tree nursery to walk in, and the Nature Center. I would love to see those places opened up and maintained. In my memory, there were no issues back then with scrapping, graffiti, or major vandalism. I am sure there were episodes but not so broad as we see these days.