By Megan Greenwell
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 23, 2007

A 234-acre park funded largely by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources will help alleviate a critical need for athletic fields and recreation land in western Charles County, state and local officials said last week.

The Maryland Board of Public Works approved $1.87 million to create Pisgah Park, which will serve residents of Indian Head and Bryans Road. Traditional offerings -- football, baseball and soccer fields, picnic facilities and a playground -- will be supplemented with a dog park and BMX bike course, officials said. Estimates indicate the park will draw 40,000 visitors a year.

"With the pretty rapid population growth in Charles County, people in Indian Head and those areas were really in need of a major park to serve those communities," said Olivia Campbell, a spokeswoman for the natural resources department. "It's just about smart growth."

The site for the park is next to a capped landfill in Pisgah, near the county recycling center. Officials said the park could expand over the landfill in the future. The county has owned the land for several years, allowing park planners to avoid the cost of land acquisition in the proposal they submitted to the state's Program Open Space funding board.

Program Open Space, created in 1969 to allocate funds for park construction and environmental preservation efforts, has long been "the lifeblood of park development in Charles County," said Tom Roland, county parks director. All told, the program, which is funded through real estate transfer taxes, will allocate $2.36 million to county parks and preservation projects in the next fiscal year, Campbell said.

"You would have a difficult time finding any of our parks that do not have some element of Program Open Space money involved," Roland said.

Pisgah Park represents an especially exciting venture for the county, Roland said, because it will incorporate new types of activities. The BMX bike course will be the first in the county; local leaders said the biking community had been requesting one for several years but that planners were unable to incorporate it into White Plains Regional Park.

Roland said he also expects to include a mountain bike trail and hiking area around the park's perimeter. An off-leash dog park, which has become standard at most county recreation centers, will be the first in the western part of the county.

"One of the main things we're trying to do is diversify the park system to not just have athletic fields," Roland said. "We want to put in as many amenities as we possibly can that will be as inclusive as possible."

Still, athletic fields will remain a major focus of newer parks because of an ongoing shortage of space where youth leagues can play. Access to sports fields has been a problem throughout the Washington region for years as expanding suburbs have dramatically increased the number of children playing team sports.

"As we build new houses or develop new town centers, sometimes we forget about giving children space outdoors to go and play on a team or with friends," Campbell said. "It's really a major issue throughout the state."

Calvert and St. Mary's counties also received money through Program Open Space for park expansion and renovation projects. St. Mary's got $1.3 million Calvert was given $1.15 million.