New Park and Playground for Parramore

By Stephen Kelly, editor

The picnic area at Z. L. Riley Park in the historic Parramore neighborhood of downtown Orlando, Fla. offers cast concrete tables and seats, plus steel grills anchored on concrete pads. Reddish brown pulverized granite mulch is used throughout the picnic area, which helps infiltrate rainfall and creates an ADA compliant surface.

To help mitigate the disruption to the Parramore neighborhood in downtown Orlando, Fla. caused by a number of expressway construction projects, the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority (OOCEA) wanted to contribute generously towards a neighborhood amenity. The city and Orlando’s Families, Parks and Recreation Department decided a new park was need for the Parramore community. To accomplish this the city and OOCEA worked together. Funding came through three government grants.

A curvilinear sidewalk surrounding the playground widens in areas to accommodate walkways and seating.

Three strategies were implemented: soliciting extensive community input, selecting a design team to incorporate the neighborhood’s wishes into the park and naming the park after a local historic figure.

Design Strategies to Encourage Community Ownership
The city took soliciting input from the community to a serious level. Denise Riccio, senior landscape architect and the city’s project manager suggested the city host a barbeque on the vacant park site for the kick-off meeting to gather neighborhood input for the new park. The meeting was a huge success with over 200 local community members attending and completing surveys about their desires for the park. The design team compiled the information in the surveys and ranked the items that the community most requested. With that information in hand, the city and consultants created a conceptual master plan which was the basis to solicit additional community comments over a period of several months at a series of over 30 special meetings and events.

Z. L. Riley Park officially opened June 5, 2010. Twenty-one integral colored concrete custom columns with contrasting colored cast stone caps circumscribe the park. The glazed tile mosaic portrait of Z.L. Riley (right) at the entrance is the work of artist Suzi Edwards. Mr. Riley’s biography is detailed at left. The mosaics made by children under the supervision of Ms. Edwards are installed on the columns.

Selecting the Design Team
Through a publicly advertised competition, the city selected the landscape architectural firm of Lucido & Associates to head up the design team. The firm’s director is landscape architect Randy Magiera.

One of the student artists poses alongside his colorful mosaic artwork on one of park’s perimeter concrete columns. The park’s fencing includes custom steel (KMG Fence) and prefabricated steel fencing (Ameristar).

The Park Gets a Name—Z.L. Riley Park
Parramore’s new 1.5 acre urban park is named for Mr. Zellie Riley, a local resident, leader, tailor and prominent businessman. In 1945 he helped establish the Negro Chamber of Commerce, now known as the African-American Chamber of Commerce of Central Florida.

Key Design Principles
Safety - It was no surprise residents saw safety as a primary concern. Crime prevention through environmental design principles were used throughout the park. There are no “hiding” places. The sight lines are open and visitors can easily see the entire park at a glance. Nighttime surveillance is easy for residents and police with the open views from surrounding streets and appropriate lighting inside the park.

Security - Residents wanted the park secure after dark. In response, the design team created a custom decorative fence and custom cast columns with steel ornaments that enhance the appearance and urban feel of the park, while keeping it secured during nonoperating hours.

Sustainability - For the city, safety and security were important, but so was sustainability. The long-term maintenance requirements for every item specified was considered. For example, integral-colored cast stone and concrete were used throughout the park for the tables, benches, fence columns, pavilion columns and entry monuments. These low-maintenance, lifetime materials only require basic cleaning. All metals are powder coated or stainless steel for durability.

“This is one of the highest quality parks with the lowest long term maintenance requirements in the city,” asserts John Perrone, RLA, manager of the city’s parks division. To save electricity, dual circuits allow the city to adjust the amount of lighting needed for security. The number of luminaries lit of course varies depending on the amount of natural light at any given time.

The large open play area lawn encourages a variety of activities and games, including practicing soccer skills. A cluster of 100-year-old oaks adds character to the park and appreciated shade from the subtropical heat.

Park Amenities
The Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority donated most of the funding to develop the park on a parcel of city-owned property. Through additional grant applications, the Community Development Block Grant and Florida Recreation Development Assistance programs provided funding for specific park amenities.

Community Events Venue
The park is designed for community gatherings. Along both sides of the main sidewalk, a 15-foot wide level area allows booths to be set up for community markets, art shows and special events. Electrical power for events is accessed at the park perimeter fence columns, and power for performances is located at the rear of the pavilion. The large lawn area at the front of the pavilion is for large groups of people to watch events taking place under the pavilion.

This attractive, colorful four-foot diameter hand-painted mosaic by artist Suzi Edwards is centered in the paving under the pavilion.

Mosaic Art Work
The city liked that the Lucido team included local mosaic artist Suzi Edwards. Suzi worked with 20 local children through Bridge to Independence, a neighborhood school, to create original mosaic art for each of the perimeter fence columns. The art pieces are 6 x 24 inches, with the signature of each student fired into to artwork. Suzi also created a mosaic portrait of Z.L Riley, a biography of his life, African-inspired mosaic scenes for the pavilion columns and animal-themed mosaics in the paving throughout the park.

Kids enjoy making their own rhythms on the playground with three musical bongos (SonicArchitecture). Each drum is tuned differently.

Playground
The playground is extremely popular and includes play equipment for a wide variety of age groups. The custom shade structure was designed to shade virtually all of the play equipment, making the playground useable even during hot Florida summer days.

The prefab pavilion has a custom top, custom painting for the roof fasica, integrally colored columns and custom glass mosaics. The children are seated at musical drum tables and enjoying the pavilion’s shade.

Pavilion
The pavilion is the centerpiece for the park. To stretch the funding dollars, the landscape architects created the look of a custom pavilion without the cost. A standard prefabricated structure was specified and adorned with a custom routed and painted fascia, LED lighted top ornament, and integral colored cast concrete column surrounds covered in glass mosaic scenes.

The large stainless steel table/drum with seats is good for picnics and jam sessions.

Musical Drum Tables and Seats
In the playground and under the pavilion, sets of stainless steel musical tables, seats and bongos create a way for visitors to interact and make music together. Each piece is tuned to produce different tones when struck, so the effect is a musical composition.

Tile checkerboards are recessed into the cast concrete game tables.

Game Tables
Sets of cast stone game tables and seats clustered along the sidewalk create places for the community to play checkers and chess. The game boards are made of black and white tiles set in the surfaces of the tables.

Picnic Area
The picnic area, consisting of cast stone tables with individual seats and barbeque grills, was strategically located in the shade of a cluster of 100-year-old oak trees. In the tradition of urban European gardens under trees, pulverized granite chips were used as mulch over the tree roots. The granite chips allow water to penetrate through the soils to feed the tree roots while creating a stable surface that is ADA compliant. The granite chip mulch also works well in the picnic area because it is nonflammable.

Two children get some help swinging higher from Beth Bartlett, a landscape designer with Lucido & Associates.

Open Play Area
The large green space in the center of the park was intentionally left open for multipurpose play. The area is depressed nine inches and serves as an area for required storm water attenuation.