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Sled-riding hill coming to Poland Township Park
POLAND
Sled-riders who have outgrown the gentle slopes of the Village Green in front of Poland Presbyterian Church are in luck.
This time next year, people will be able to sled at a new, steeper hill in Poland Township Park.
“I look around our town here, and the only place I see anybody doing any sled-riding is at the Poland Presbyterian [Church] hill. Why should our residents have to drive all the way down to Mill Creek Park when we have this resource right here?” said township Trustee Bob Lidle.
Construction is underway on the hill, which will be located just east of the park’s playground and parking area.
The property on which the hill is being built is owned by Republic Services-operated Carbon Limestone Landfill, which leases the park land between Cowden, Moore and Miller roads, to the township for $1 annually. The park will gain that area when Republic Services gives the township an additional 15 acres of land to add to the park’s 77 acres.
Republic Services is handling — and paying for — the sled-riding hill project as part of a multimillion-dollar drainage project for the landfill.
The effort to give Poland residents an area for winter recreation was a bit of an uphill climb. Lidle first came up with the idea about 10 years ago, but, “there were so many bureaucratic things we had to jump through,” he said.
“The sled-riding hill and [adding new] sidewalks are two things that I always wanted to have done here,” Lidle said of the township. He used to take his own kids to the hill near the church, but always thought the community should have a bigger, better hill.
When the hill is not being used for recreation, the high-school crosscountry teams will use it during practices, and possibly in the future as part of its own course.
Construction should be completed in a few months, and grass will be planted there during the summer.
The sledding hill is one of a few additions to the park, which opened in 2009 and is home to the fields used by the Poland Youth Soccer Association.
Community leaders are raising money to build a 25,000-square-foot indoor activity center in the park. Water and sewer lines, donated by private companies, were installed in the park recently near the site of the planned facility.
Republic Services plans to add a wetland area adjacent to the park.
“The wetland is an area set aside in perpetuity that nobody is allowed to disturb, but it’ll be there for educational purposes. You can take your kids out there and show them how the wetlands developed,” said Mike Heher, Republic Services division manager.
Kids also are whom Lidle had in mind when he came up with the idea for the hill.
“Let them go outside and have some fun,” he said.