Ulysses unveils first community park draft designs following public survey

More than a dozen community members attended an open house at Ulysses Town Hall last week to weigh in on how the town’s first public park should be developed.

The Nov. 12 information session was the third open house scheduled for the project, and the first since town officials concluded a weeks-long community survey earlier this month to gather public input on the park. In August, the town accepted a 15-acre land donation along Cold Springs Road from residents Marvin and Allison Pritts, which will be used for recreational purposes. 

The town partnered with Cornell University’s Design Connect program to administer the survey and develop the two draft designs that were displayed last week, and it will work to finalize a single draft design before the end of the year.    

“I’m really appreciative of the community participation and enthusiasm, which I think is clearly reflected in how many people participated in our survey and the diversity of items people are interested in,” Town Supervisor Katelin Olson said, noting that the survey received about 500 responses. “We have two potential early designs, and it’s great to have Cornell Design Connect students contributing to this process because it’s expensive to hire consultants — and it’s a great opportunity for the town to be able to collect this community feedback.”

According to the publicly available survey results, residents said that the features they would most like in the park are pathways for walking, biking and cross country; natural areas like meadows, ponds and pollinator gardens; and sports fields/courts. These proposals received more support than other suggestions, such as a playground, a dog park and a community garden. 

The survey also asked respondents which sports fields/courts they would most want. Soccer received the most votes, followed by other popular choices, including tennis/pickleball, baseball/softball and basketball. These sports beat out others, including track, volleyball and football.  

The Cornell Design Connect students said that the two draft designs are similar, with slight differences in where certain elements are geographically placed. Both designs place a baseball and soccer field at the end of the park to mitigate noise near residential areas. The first design plan also includes two playgrounds, while the second design plan includes one playground and one garden. 

Community members had the opportunity to provide feedback on the draft designs by writing suggestions on sticky notes. Some additional elements requested by community members were composting toilets, designated areas for dogs to use the bathroom, picnic tables and adequate parking and water refill stations.  

“At the end of this semester, we hope to provide a very well-rounded design proposal and overall recommendation in as many aspects that we can cover,” said Brandon Chen, one of the 12 student members of Cornell Design Connect. “Following that would be the town looking for funding and then executing each of the phases we propose.”

Olson said that Ulysses is still years away from opening the park, noting that the town must first finish legally acquiring the land parcel. This requires the town’s Board of Zoning Appeals voting to do so, which Olson said would likely be accompanied by a public hearing — a process that could last into early next year.