Mobile allows facelift for park: Developer will landscape narrow area in Midtown

The Mobile City Council will let a developer build and maintain an existing public park on a narrow strip of land in Midtown.

The measure passed unanimously and with almost no dissent Oct. 20, a sharp contrast from 2cm HALF years ago, when several neighboring homeowners complained that the project would basically make the park into a front yard for expensive houses.

Helix Properties, the developer of the Mount Island Place subdivision, will landscape and construct the park, which is on a 10-foot-wide, 670-foot-long plot of land next to Mt. Island Drive East.

The subdivision's homeowners' association will maintain the park, said Marc Watkins, who works for Helix. The plan is to clear unruly bushes and weeds and have a sidewalk that meanders through trees on the property.

The council voted unanimously on Tuesday to allow the developer to landscape the park. The only dissent was from a nearby resident on the other side of Mount Island Drive who was worried that a sidewalk would take up most of the space for the park.

In 2007, several Mount Island Drive residents said they wanted the park to stay the way it was to provide a buffer between their houses and the new development.

Others voiced concerns that the developer would turn the park into a front yard for the new homes. The houses face the park and Mount Island Drive, but the driveways are all accessible behind the homes, from an alley that starts where Old Government Street dead ends.

But Watkins stressed that the park would remain public. He said he is putting up a 4-foot-tall fence with gates between the park and the homes of the new subdivision.

Scott Hawk, who lives on Mount Island Drive, said Tuesday that he has been impressed by the new subdivision, where houses are listed for more than a half-million dollars.

"This park will enhance the ambience of the whole Midtown area," he said.