Balcones Park & Pool

Balcones Park got an excellent facelift last Saturday during the 1st ever Fall – It’s My Park Day! A Huge Thanks to Erik Harris, Austin Parks Foundation, Aggies Selflessly Serving In Shaping Tomorrow (ASSIST) who accounted for a majority of our volunteers, Home Depot and i Fratelli Pizza who generously donated their delicious pizza to all of the volunteers!

If you haven’t tried i Fratelli Pizza yet you should! A perfect dinner option while holding your breath over the elections maybe… (512) 795-8744 www.ifratelli.net
(Don’t forget to tell them Thanks for supporting our park when you call!)

We felt very fortunate that the great group of ASSIST traveled all the way from College Station to break a sweat, get soaking wet and dirty to make a difference in our park! A great bunch of students!

The volunteers accomplished improvements along edge of the basketball court, plantings at the bathroom rain garden, trash pickup, debris clearing in the creek, reclaiming of the playground pea gravel and more! We hope you all see the hard work when you are out next enjoying the park! For more pictures go here.

Your Signature is Needed on this Petition to help us get a grant to make much needed repairs to the Walnut Creek Trail that runs on the East side of Balcones Park! It just takes 1 minute! Thanks!

Click HERE to sign the Petition.

More details HERE

Click HERE to sign the petition. It only takes 2 minutes.

To review the proposed repairs view this Adobe .pdf document

There are 4 main break downs in the current paved trail and they are getting worse rapidly. In addition one is upstream from the endangered Jollyville Salamander’s habitat and continued erosion might cause the habitat and salamander some problems. We are proposing that we fix these issues which would make the trail bike and stroller worthy and once the Connector Trail to Walnut Metro Creek Park is complete it will make for a very nice loop around the edge of Balcones Park.

Please help us by signing the above petition if you are a stakeholder, user of the park, or resident in north Austin.

We hope you can join us at… A COMMUNITY INPUT MEETING FOR BALCONES DISTRICT PARK IMPROVEMENTS

To view the below with graphics click here

About the Project:
Balcones Park has been awarded $200,000 in NPP & APF grants and an additional estimated $300,000 in city funds to make the following improvements to Balcones Park within the next two years.

• Add shade to the pool
• Install a pavilion
• Install a new, larger playground

Due to the large scope of the projects and funding, the city requires a park concept plan with community input before implementing these improvements. We have been very fortunate to have 3 landscape designers, Neal Charles, Kim Gilbertson, and Kristy Street, willing to donate their time to create a concept plan for the park which allows the project to move forward full-steam ahead after we acquire solid feedback from stakeholders, like yourselves.

Community Input:
Community input is imperative in this process! We need your ideas! Please come participate, share your ideas, and help shape our wonderful park. Your input is necessary for creating a long-term vision for our park as well as for solidifying the details of the three large improvements listed above.

Upcoming Input Meeting Dates:

Saturday***, August 13th at 9:30am at Milwood Baptist Church – RSVP now
Tuesday, August 16th at 7:30pm at Milwood Baptist Church – RSVP now

*** Supervised play will be available for children over the age of three at the church’s gated playground for the August 13th meeting. Children are welcome at the meeting as well. Please RSVP above if you plan to have a child attend that needs supervision so we can be certain we can accommodate you.

If you can’t make either of the face-to-face meetings, you can send your input through an online survey, which will be posted shortly. Stay tuned for survey information or send us an email to make sure you are on the email list to receive the survey.

For More Information or to RSVP:
Please contact Meg Davis or Bethany Metzger, Board Members of Milwood NA at 512-636-9176 or by email to balconespark@gmail.com.

For those interested in more details, you can find the full commentary at www.balconespark.org.

Take Survey to give your feedback about the time and day that would work best or if you would like to see another program or class offered in the park:

It’s My Park Day brought in 168 volunteers for a total of 404.5 hours, so we are looking great for our volunteer hour requirements. The volunteer hours promised to get the NPP and APF Grant total 1,220 volunteer hours over the next two years in Balcones Park.

A BIG Thanks to Erik Harris, MNA’s Park & Greenbelt Chair, for spearheading this year’s biggest IMPD ever at our park!

Our fundraiser through Amplify Austin’s 24 hour event was very successful. We raised almost $4,500 towards our goal of $15,000! A Huge Thank You to all those who donated and those who helped us spread the word on the event as well!

Walgreens is hosting their Annual Easter Egg Hunt THIS Saturday at Balcones Park from 11 to 1pm.

There will be hot dogs, drinks, music, games and photos with an Easter Bunny along with the easter egg hunt! All are welcome!

For details on the Grants & Project Scope or to give feedback go to: www.milwoodna.com

Help us raise the $15,000 cash match for Balcones Park so we can get the $200,000 in grants from Austin Parks Foundation and Neighborhood Partnering Program!

Donating is simple:

– Donate via https://www.gofundme.com/balconespark