As Mr. Wheatley mentions in his Fresh Loaf post, we’ve been chatting about what’s going on with all the construction at Deepdene Park – the eastern end of the Ponce Olmstead parks – for a while now; speculating whether its a bike path or a new park or just utility work.

Obviously if this was a city of Decatur project, lord knows we would have known about it years ago and already talked the thing to death. But since we’re wondering about a construction out in “the County”, the time-tested approach of contacting the proper officials doesn’t always bear much fruit.

But Wheatley’s got the mad journalistic skills of a beat-reporting ninja, so he was able to unearth a few details about this project.  Check it…

Is it a PATH trail, perhaps one that will offer Decaturites and Druid Hills and Fernbank residents a connection to Candler Park and the Freedom Park trail? The nonprofit trailbuilder tells CL no. We found a few details on this Olmstead Linear Park Alliance website, but were still left curious.

According to the county, the construction is part of a streetscape improvement that will — ta da! — result in an eight-foot-wide sidewalk similar to those winding through the other greenspaces along Ponce.

And the Olmstead Linear Parks website now has this blurb…

The proposed $4 million rehabilitation of Deepdene will be done in stages. Priorities include remediation of severe erosion and storm water problems, burial of utilities and construction of curbing. To make the park safer and more accessible, appropriate lighting and signage will be installed and a sidewalk and row of trees will be added along Ponce de Leon Avenue. In the interior, the path system will be realigned and expanded, and the proliferation of non-native invasive plants will be controlled.

So, is that the long and short of it?  Questions still remain unanswered.  Like, what will happen to the soccer field area?  Anyone know?

Wheatley reports over on Fresh Loaf that the Governor has signed off on allowing ARC trade $25 million in stimulus money to MARTA yesterday in exchange for capital improvements around stations.  Along with that the gov also approved another $96 million in stimulus projects yesterday.

The only DeKalb projects on the list were $1.2 million for the Olmsteadian Deepdene Park improvements and $868,00 for the South River Trail.

I’ll try to find out more about the details of Deepdene, but in the meantime Xenia – who had her front yard ripped up last year –  recently wondered in an email whether Decatur/DeKalb could get any funding to make more pedestrian-friendly improvements to Scott Boulevard.

Apprx. one year later, I now have a bunch of anemic weeds (the green stuff that was supposed to be grass seed obviously didn’t take) where I once had a very nice, thick, healthy, monkey grass barrier on the median that protected walkers from Scott blvd. traffic–not far from Venetian pools where foot traffic has increased along with dangerous traffic issues. Question: Is there anything in the works to improve (nonexistent) curbs and sidewalks along Scott given the new opportunities for projects due to Federal stimulus monies?

I recall asking the city about potential stimulus projects in the city limits, but I don’t think I ever received a response from Hugh Saxon, so I don’t have a list of anything off-hand that’s potentially “shovel-ready.”  (Though I do have an extensive list of home improvement projects that are more than shovel-ready.)