LEXINGTON, S.C. — The Town of Lexington is working on plans to renovate one of its most popular parks.
As the weather gets nicer, many people are headed back out to the parks. One place a lot of families love to go to is Virginia Hylton Park in Downtown Lexington.
"This is a beautiful community. It's kind of a small town atmosphere," said Marc Meadows. "With everything going on the last 12 months or so with the pandemic, it's nice to be able to kind of get out and do some things that we've done in the past or like to do."
Marc and Megan Meadows come out to the park often.
"We come here all the time and it's so nice in the summer because it's one of the only shaded areas to play," said Megan.
One thing you'll notice while you're walking around the park is signs talking about future expansion.
"We were walking over there by the park and I think they're going to redo this whole thing. I don't know what the time frame looks on that," explained Megan. "That would be good to know."
A few years ago, Mayor Steve MacDougall announced changes would be coming to the park.
"It's great for people to be able to enjoy the parks again and to get out and enjoy the sunshine," said Laurin Barnes, the spokesperson for the Town of Lexington. "Virginia Hylton Park is one of our most popular parks in town. It's nice to see people getting out and being able to enjoy it."
The town is still in the planning process of the expansion, figuring out what it will look like a feature.
"Despite the pandemic, plans are moving forward to renovate Virginia Hylton Park. It will include an expansion of 8.25 acres, so it will more than double the size of the park," explained Barnes.
The Town of Lexington has been discussing the renovations for the past two years. The reason for the delay is partly due to funding.
A couple of years ago, Lexington developed the Virginia-Hylton-Park Committee to help fund the renovations to the park.
The mayor said in his 2019 State of the Town address that the Lexington Beautification Foundation has committed $200,000 to the project.
Originally, the renovations discussed included adding more pavilions, recreational areas and garden and yoga areas. All these amenities are still being considered, along with accommodations for people with disabilities.
"There has to be a lot of work done for the grading to make it ADA compliant," said Barnes. "There will be a lot of changes when it comes to how the park is accessed and make sure it's accessible to everyone and all inclusive."
At this time, there is no timetable on when updates to the park will be begin. They do hope when they start construction for the renovations, it will take a year to complete.
"It's important as the town grows, more and more people come to the park, it's long overdue for an upgrade," explained Barnes. "Also a big thing is having an all inclusive playground so everyone can play on the same playground because back in the day when the park was built, you had your special needs playground and you had the non-special needs playground so it's really important to bring the community together and give kids one centralized place to have fun."
Once the Town of Lexington announces new updates to the park and when the changes could be happening, Street Squad Lexington will let you know once that information becomes available.