Council approves land purchase for Darlington playground
By Melissa Rollins, Editor, editor@newsandpress.net
After an executive session at the end of the Nov. 14 city council meeting, Darlington City Council voted to purchase land to build a city playground. The land on Siskron Street will be purchased for $80,500.
Darlington County Parks and Recreation Director Lee Andrews presented the proposal to council.
“The property is on Siskron Street; it is an old Po Boy Restaurant,” Andrews said. “We proposed to buy all that property there between Siskron Street and Hampton Street behind the DSS Building. We are going to turn that into a playground.”
Andrews said that this project will not replace the idea of a sports complex but will be an added value to the residents of Darlington.
“Everything that we are doing is for the quality of life here in Darlington,” Andrews said. “This is probably going to run more in conjunction with the trail system than the ballfields. My ultimate goal is to tie every park we end up building together where we can walk to each one. As long as there is a sidewalk we can get to it.”
Though the plan is not yet set in stone, Andrews said that he has some ideas of what he would like to see on the playground.
“We are looking at having a toddler playground and one for older kids,” he said. “I think the last time we built a playground was in the 40’s. We’ll have some swings. We are looking at having some exercise equipment there for parents so they can do something while the kids are playing. We are even exploring having a dog park there. We have done a layout to kind of see what we can fit there but we are bringing in our playground guru, Gordon Hamilton, and we are going to sit down and see what we can really do.”
Andrews said that he is glad council gave this proposal their blessing and that he would continue his quest to find space for baseball and softball fields.
“We had been eyeballing this property here and there,” Andrews said. “Anytime something big comes open, we look at it.”
