The Willow Glen Resident

Photograph by Skye Dunlap

The Park's Rebirth: 'I think the neighbors are going to be more excited about it when it reopens, because they already have a better sense of ownership and pride,' says Gregory Plaza Neighborhood Association president Mary Pizzo-Maggio.

New playground equipment is planned for Gregory Plaza

Neighbors look forward to having a new place for children to play

By Michelle Ku

Gregory Street is the home of an empty plot of land that once was and will again be the Gregory Plaza Tot Lot. Through the temporary chain-link fence blocking access to the park, African daisies can be seen beginning to open. The daffodils planted by neighbors have already burst into bloom.

Marie Raitz and her 7-year-old son, Joshua, live next door to the tot lot, currently an empty lot. Since December, the park has been fenced up and stripped of its playground equipment in preparation for the new equipment scheduled to go in.

"I'd like to see [the installation of playground equipment] done before school is out. It would give my son and grandchildren a place to play and a place for me to go for some 'me' time," Raitz said.

While the park has already undergone major changes during the last year and a half, neighbors are preparing for more. During the next month, the installation of the new equipment and the construction of a wall separating the park from Interstate 280 and Los Gatos Creek will begin.

Work on the wall is set to begin within the next two weeks, said parks manager Michael LaRocca of the San Jose Parks and Recreation Department. Project manager Ubaldo Perez estimated that the project would be completed by the end of June.

The project will cost about $35,000, incorporating a $30,000 grant from the city's San Jose Beautiful program and $5,000 from District 6 Councilmember Frank Fiscalini's office, said Mary Pizzo-Maggio, president of the Gregory Plaza Neighborhood Association.

The playground installation has been delayed by rains and because the contractor doing the work, Collishaw Construction Inc., needs to complete another installation of playground equipment, at Evergreen Park in the Evergreen area, before beginning the work at Gregory Plaza, LaRocca said.

In bidding out the contract, the parks and recreation department packaged the three playground installation projects in one contract, LaRocca said. Work at Danna Rock Park by the old Monterey Highway has been completed, and crews poured the concrete footings for the major items of the play equipment at Evergreen Park last week. Work at Evergreen should be completed by the end of May, Perez said.

Construction workers will be building a wall along the back of the tot lot and installing playground equipment, rubberized surface and landscaping to cover the wall, said Pizzo-Maggio. "We're looking forward to a brand-new shiny playground the kids can play in."

The 8-foot concrete wall is also meant to stop the homeless people who used a path from Los Gatos Creek from entering the park, Pizzo-Maggio said.

Even though it is easier to maintain the tanbark surface often used in playgrounds, members of the GPNA requested that the city install a rubberized surface. This will provide better access for the several wheelchair-bound people in the neighborhood, Pizzo-Maggio said.

Installation of the playground equipment at Gregory Plaza will mark the end of an almost two-year project for members of the GPNA, an organization formed in 1996 to clean up the once-rundown park.

"Right now it looks torn down and cornered off, but I think the neighbors are going to be more excited about it when it reopens, because they already have a better sense of ownership and pride. Before, it was an abandoned spot in the neighborhood where they didn't want to bring their children to play," Pizzo-Maggio said.

Before the GPNA began its efforts, the park was plagued by evidence of drug and alcohol use. "It used to be bad," Raitz said. "We used to find needles in the park and on the sidewalk. I used to go in there and chase the transients out."

Since the GPNA held its cleanup and landscaping days, the park has remained vandalism-free for more than a year, Pizzo-Maggio said. "Once we [cleaned up the park], we found the park stayed really nice," she said. "The tagging has disappeared, and we found the people who had been using the park for illegal activities like drinking and drugs have fallen off."

The GPNA recently received the first-place Neighborhood Improvement Award in the San Jose Beautiful program cluster of fall 1997 home improvement awards.

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