Since Cold Springs Park was donated to the city of McHenry in 1994 by the Park Ridge Estates subdivision builder, there has been little development on the 46-acre parcel.

A new proposal developed by the McHenry parks and recreation department, with the help of Hitchcock Design Group and resident input, would spend $1.2 million to enhance Cold Springs’ multi-use trail; add nature-based play and fitness areas, an outdoor classroom area with seating and parking; and connect the park’s trail to the McHenry County Conservation District‘s Prairie Path.

“A lot of the park we are not going to touch,” Bill Hobson, parks and recreation director, told the McHenry City Council Monday. But there are areas that would be rehabbed into a more natural state, including through the removal of buckthorn and other invasive species, he added.

Residents were vocal in their desire to keep the park passive with only minimal amenities, Hobson said.

The council voted 6-1 to approve the plan and to authorize the city to submit the proposal to the state for consideration for an Open Space Lands Acquisitions and Development grant. If successful, McHenry would be eligible for up to $600,000 in funding, the total match allowed by the grant program. The city’s half would be funded by its park development donation fund, Hobson said.

Alderwoman Chris Bassi, 4th Ward, was the lone dissenting vote, stating the proposal was “too much for too little improvements.”

The mowed grass trail that cuts through the park – which is two-thirds wetlands – would be expanded from .66 miles to .78 miles, according to the proposal. That trail would include both paved and crushed stone sections, use boardwalks to cross wet areas, and include a birding observation deck and another overlook site too.

Second Ward Alderman Andy Glab questioned the need for the observation deck, noting the plan called for $115,000 “to build a deck to look at birds.”

Glab also wondered if connecting to the Prairie Trail would bring “out-of-towners” into the neighborhood park.

“How are we going to monitor that?” Glab asked, adding “not that we are not welcoming to out-of-towners” but that he was concerned about a bad element coming through McHenry on the trail.

Concern about who may visit the neighborhood park – and the price tag for an enlarged parking lot – were parts of why an earlier plan for Cold Springs was spiked.

Back in 2009, former McHenry Alderwoman Geri Condon told the City Council this week, she received threats for her vote approving a disc golf course the park, which is in the ward she represented.

“There was an email circulating in the subdivision with threats to my family. They were going to protest at my home,” she told the current City Council.

That plan eventually died when parking lot construction was estimated at $150,000, according to news reports. Another pitch for a disc golf course there was shelved in October 2023, with the Friends of Cold Springs Park and resident Iver Johnson vowing to work with The Land Conservancy of McHenry County to clear the trails and wetlands.

The nonprofit land conservancy has not held a work day there recently, director Lisa Haderlein said in an email Tuesday to the Northwest Herald.

Condon and other park neighbors who attended Monday’s meeting said they were largely in favor of the new plan.

“Thank you for doing something with this park,” resident Roger Freund said, adding he lives right next to it “and I am thrilled that you are all considering upgrading the park so that it is usable.”

He did question whether a playground is needed there.

The proposed playground is nature-based, Hobson said. Photos submitted with the proposal shows play structures made of logs with rope and rock climbing areas.

Having a usable park there is something residents of the subdivision were promised when they moved in.

“The promise made to us in 1998 is finally realized,” Kathryn Cone said, adding the children she raised in the house next to the park are adults now and that, in many years, the parkland was never maintained.

“My husband and I would like to enjoy it here before we are too old to do so,” Cone said.

OSLAD grant recipients are announced in December or January.