City will soon have pickleball courts at Columbus Park
Lynsey Green of the Columbia Falls Head Start plays at Columbus Park last week. The park will soon see pickleball courts.
By CHRIS PETERSON
Hungry Horse News
Columbia Falls will soon see new outdoor pickleball courts.
The city council last week approved a $92,800 contract with Triton Construction of Big Arm to build four new courts at Columbus Park.
Several pickleball enthusiasts have lobbied the city for pickleball courts in the past and one anonymous donor has committed $25,000 of private funding for the project.
The city is still hoping to get a $40,000 AARP grant, but word on the grant won’t come until the end of June. Grant or not, the city wants to move forward with the project.
“The Columbia Falls Parks Committee is recommending approval of the contract due to the significant public interest and new amenity for our citizens even in the event the city does not receive the $40k AARP grant,” city manager Susan Nicosia noted in her report to council.
The courts will be built where the old tennis courts used to be.
There is also room for a sand volleyball court, but city council didn’t go forward with a bid of $18,650 for that. The city already has plans to put bathrooms in at the park soon.
Columbus Park is a popular park on the east side of the city. It already has a playground and a brand new basketball court, which has proven popular not only with locals, but even folks from other towns.
In other infrastructure news:
• Triton will likely put the finishing sealing on the city’s new tennis courts at Hoerner Park in early June. The company said it needs four warm nights in a row. The high school tennis team has been playing on the courts with temporary lines and nets. There has been some concern about the tennis team using the courts outside of normal school hours. The school stopped doing that. The city is trying to keep the courts as clean as possible, so they don’t have to be washed excessively when the final surface is put down.
• The city is moving forward on the 12th Avenue West project, which should go out to bid soon. The $1.2 million project will rebuild the ailing road and bring city sewer and water to the Cedar Palace Medical Center.
The project is funded by a federal Economic Development Authority grant of more than $660,000 and the remainder is split by the city and the medical center. The city recently received a permit from Burlington Northern Railway to drill under the tracks, but the railroad also wanted to city to upgrade the crossing at a cost of $72,000. The city balked at that and instead will stop the street project just before the crossing, which is a spur line and sees only occasional train traffic and at slow speeds at that.
“We will not let our EDA project get derailed by BNSF,” Nicosia told council.
• The state continues to work on a new bike/pedestrian path that will run from Fourth Avenue West and up Railroad Street. Bids on that project are expected to be awarded in July. The city has to match about $154,000 toward the estimated $1.15 million project.
• The green boxes on Best Way Drive are slated to see paving of the lot. The dump site is currently gravel and is littered with potholes and dusty in the summer.