Kessler Mountain Regional Park in Fayetteville to gain second baseball complex

Austin Sutton (right) of Fayetteville and his son, Titan Sutton, 8, ride downhill Saturday, Feb. 20, 2021, near ball fields while sledding at Kessler Mountain Regional Park in Fayetteville. The Fayetteville City Council on Thursday approved a nearly $6.4 million construction contract to build a second four-field baseball complex at the park. Visit nwaonline.com/210221Daily/ for today's photo gallery. 
(NWA Democrat-Gazette/Andy Shupe)
Austin Sutton (right) of Fayetteville and his son, Titan Sutton, 8, ride downhill Saturday, Feb. 20, 2021, near ball fields while sledding at Kessler Mountain Regional Park in Fayetteville. The Fayetteville City Council on Thursday approved a nearly $6.4 million construction contract to build a second four-field baseball complex at the park. Visit nwaonline.com/210221Daily/ for today's photo gallery. (NWA Democrat-Gazette/Andy Shupe)

FAYETTEVILLE -- Another baseball complex for Kessler Mountain Regional Park will spur the city's economy and meet a growing demand for youth recreational play, parks employees and league backers say.

The City Council on Thursday approved a nearly $6.4 million contract with Crossland Heavy Contractors to build a second, four-field baseball complex just north of the existing one.

The project includes a 211-space parking lot, a concession and restroom building and batting cages, with artificial turf on the fields.

The move marks the next phase of the overall development of the park, said Ted Jack, park planning superintendent. The nearly 620-acre site lies about 1½ miles southwest of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and has a nature preserve side and a park side.

The 387-acre nature preserve to the west includes 13 miles of soft trails and a mountain reaching more than 1,800 feet above sea level. The 232-acre park area boasts six soccer fields, four baseball fields, two restrooms and concession buildings, about 400 parking spaces and a playground near the entrance at 2600 W. Judge Cummings Road.

Lose & Associates developed a multiphase plan for the park side in 2012. Construction for the first phase wrapped in 2016, and artificial turf was installed on the four baseball fields last year.

Nearly $12.9 million has been spent on construction at the park. Work included the amenities in that initial phase, plus ground work, stormwater work, lighting, roads and utilities. Money came from a mix of a bond issue voters approved in November 2013 using hotel, motel and restaurant sales tax revenue and the parks development fund.

Remaining work to finish out the plan is estimated at more than $18 million and includes a four-field softball complex at the northwest corner of the park; basketball, tennis and sand volleyball courts; another soccer field; a playground and amphitheater area with a pavilion; trails; more parking and restrooms; recreation and park offices; and a maintenance building.

The entire cost to build out the master plan for the park could end up about $39 million. The park's construction is happening as money becomes available, Jack said.

The city runs its own softball program. Adult softball is played at Gary Hampton Park, while youth games are held at the Lake Fayetteville softball complex, with practices at Wilson Park. The facilities have met the demand for softball, which is why the softball complex at Kessler is in a later phase of development, Parks Director Connie Edmonston said.

Construction of the second baseball complex and associated features should take about 14 months, Jack said. Money is coming from the parks bond issue voters approved in 2019.

"It should make it a really attractive facility for tournaments," Jack said. "You've got eight fields all together, instead of having some fields over here and some fields over there."

Play on

Fayetteville Youth Baseball, a nonprofit organization, which hosts recreational leagues in spring and fall for more than 1,000 children ages 4-15, splits its games among Kessler, Walker and White River parks. Participation has grown along with the city's population, and having four more fields will enable families to stay in one spot, rather than taking children from one park to another, said Sarah Hood, board member for the organization.

Last fall's league took place entirely at Kessler to follow covid-19 safety protocols, Hood said. It was easier for coaches and volunteers to keep an eye on people and sanitize equipment at one location. It was the most popular fall league ever, with about 300 players, she said. The spring league usually has about 800 participants.

The goal is to host as many games at Kessler as possible and use Walker Park as a practice field, Hood said.

"Kessler is the destination," she said. "We hear that from families after every season, that they love Kessler. It's more modern, there's better parking and it had new turf installed this past year."

The organization also partners with Arkansas Premier Tournaments to help host regional youth baseball tournaments. Having eight fields at Kessler will enable the city to host youth World Series-type events, as opposed to smaller tournaments, said Michael Ferguson, also a Fayetteville Youth Baseball board member.

Kessler may host 15 to 30 teams from within and outside the state on any given weekend in the spring, Ferguson said. The number could double with twice the number of fields, he said.

Up to 60 teams visiting on weekends translates to tourism dollars for the city, considering all the players, coaches and family members coming from out of town, Ferguson said. Experience Fayetteville, the city's tourism bureau, coordinates hotel stays during tournaments, he said.

The city's 2% hotel, motel and restaurant sales tax has waned during the pandemic. Last year's revenue was about $1.3 million less than 2019. Revenue started dipping significantly in March, when the pandemic ushered bar and restaurant closings across the state, with limited capacity implemented in the months thereafter.

The city collected just more than $6 million in hotel, motel and restaurant sales tax revenue last year, compared to more than $7.4 million the year before. Half of the revenue from the tax goes to tourism and the other half goes to parks.

Slip slidin' away

City staff is trying to figure out what to do with a slope southwest of the baseball fields that became unstable after torrential rains hit the city in April 2017.

The soil is a type of fat clay that becomes saturated and too heavy to stand on that steep of a slope so it slides, Public Works Director Chris Brown said. When water penetrates the ground, it hits a layer of rock, or shale, beneath. When the water can't go any farther, it creates a slip plane, he said.

"There was some discussion about who was at fault, and ultimately we settled on Mother Nature," Brown said. "It started to fail when we had this disaster event."

The city is considering a few solutions. The easiest would be to flatten the slope, but that would require cutting down several trees into the protected natural area. The area is protected under a conservation easement with the Northwest Arkansas Land Trust, and the city would have to consult the land trust before doing any work, Brown said.

Another option would be to install a retaining wall, but preliminary work would have to be done to ensure the wall wouldn't come down. A third option is to dig the soil out and replace it with better material. Either of those two options could cost in excess of $1 million, Brown said.

The slope does not present a danger to the public, he said. It's just unsightly. The city has been hauling out the fallen dirt.

Brown said the Parks Department is evaluating the best solution and where to get the money. Jack said the department hopes to use money from its capital budget to fix the slope. However, with hotel, motel and restaurant sales tax revenue down, it may be a while, he said.

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A little history

Planning for a regional park in the city began in 2000. In 2010, Chambers Bank donated about 200 acres for what would become the park side of Kessler Mountain Regional Park. The city acquired an additional 387 acres of adjoining forest land for use as a nature preserve and outdoor recreation area. The acquisition was made possible through a $1.5 million Walton Family Foundation Grant and an agreement with the Fayetteville Natural Heritage Association. A conservation easement was created in 2016, with the Northwest Arkansas Land Trust overseeing, to protect the natural land from urban development. Other acquisitions increased the size of the whole park to 620 acres, making it the city’s second-biggest park, behind Lake Sequoyah. So far, about 80 acres have been used on the park side for sports fields, parking and trails.

Source: Fayetteville

Stacy Ryburn can be reached by email at [email protected] or on Twitter @stacyryburn.

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