Greenville County has a new park in its future

By Charles Sowell  

JANUARY 30, 2010 11:09 a.m. (0)

Major work could start soon on Cedar Falls Park that will hopefully give residents of Southern Greenville County their own version of Cleveland Park by sometime in 2011 or 2012.

The 95-acre park was purchased with $1.6 million of Greenville’s $2.7 million share in mitigation funds left over from the state settlement in Colonial Pipeline oil spill of 1996.

Cedar Falls is rapidly becoming part of the Greenville County Recreation Department’s (GCRD) larger plan for expansion to areas like paddling trails.

If things go as anticipated, said Paul Ellis, planning director for GCRD, Cedar Falls will be the terminus of a paddling trail that starts at River Falls Park in Greenville.

But there are issues to deal with before that can happen, said Gene Smith, executive director of GCRD.

Among them is refurbishing the old dam at Cedar Falls.

The 100-year-old structure is sound, overall, said Dave Hargett, a consultant hired by GCRD to assess the dam and hazards contained in sediments backed up behind it.

“Essentially, Cedar Falls has the same sorts of industrial pollutants as Conestee,” Hargett said. “But in lesser concentrations.”

Officials at Conestee Nature Park concede that, were it not for the beneficial effects of cleaner sediments washing downstream with each passing flood, Lake Conestee and the surrounding wetlands would be a Superfund site. A representative sample of the industrial age’s pollutants can be found buried in Conestee.

Conestee was paid for with funds from the Colonial spill, too, Smith said, and the recreation department plans to follow the same containment strategy used at Conestee.

“A bigger issue so far as we are concerned,” said Smith, “Is the condition of the pinstocks (bottom feed sluices) at the dam.”

The pinstocks have no gates and need to be fixed or closed off, Smith said. The recreation department is working out details on funding now.

Currently the only time there is water going over the dam at Cedar Falls is when the river is in flood, or when debris block the pinstocks.

The logjam could create a dangerous situation for paddlers forced against the debris by the force of the river with no way to get free, Hargett said.

The pinstocks are part of the area’s rich history that is documented back to the early 19^th Century when water from the shoals was used to power a woolen mill and saw mill. In the early 20^th Century the large dam, 350-feet from bank to bank, was built to power one of the region’s first electric generating plants.

Eventually, the recreation department plans to open an interpretive historical display that uses the dam and line of old stone cradles leading from the pinstocks to the former generator tower as a tourist draw.

Smith said GCRD plans to use $400,000 in just received state funding to build a playground area and walking trail on high ground near the shoals.

“We’ve found whenever we build a park that these trails get heavy usage,” said Ellis. “Moms can leave their kids to play in the park and keep an eye on them as they walk their laps.”

There will be wildlife enhancements like food plots, said Ellis.

“The park is home to the only Great Blue Heron rookery on the Reedy,” Ellis said.

Between 10 and 12 mated pairs of the huge wading birds use trees lining the pond upstream of Cedar Falls dam as the place to raise their young.

“It’s quite a sight,” Hargett said.

By the time the park is complete there will also be parking areas, restrooms, picnic facilities as well as paved and gravel walking trails.

Comments

Add New

Leave a Comment
Comments are moderated and may not be posted immediately.
Name:
Email:	do not notifynotify
Title:
	Please input the anti-spam code that you can read in the image.

3.26 Copyright (C) 2008 Compojoom.com / Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."