Brookfield will keep open the possibility of a pedestrian bridge over Salt Creek as it looks to fund a new and improved playground at Creekside Park.
At the Aug. 26 committee of the whole meeting, Brookfield’s village board heard a presentation from Parks and Recreation Director Luke Gundersen about proposed improvements to Creekside Park, including a bridge to South Kiwanis Park, that the village hopes to fund with a $600,000 grant from the state’s Open Space Lands Acquisition and Development program this year. He asked trustees to decide whether the village should seek to fund the project in two phases, which would require another grant application next year but could result in more available funding, or in just one phase, which would be less risky but lead to a more expensive project for the village.
Gundersen said Brookfield needs to submit an application for the grant by Sept. 13. The village will learn if it receives a grant by the end of next April. According to a preliminary timeline, construction should start in March 2026 and end in October 2026.
The proposed changes to Creekside Park include a new playground with pour-in-place rubber surfacing, similar to what’s going in at Ehlert Park. It will incorporate slides, climbing walls, swings and a mock storefront that kids can use for “imaginative play,” said Daniel Wilson, a landscape architect at Wight & Company, the firm Brookfield is employing to assist with the OSLAD grant application. Wight designed the renovations to Ehlert Park that are now under construction, which the firm is also overseeing.
Other additions consist of a sun shelter with game tables, boards and sacks to play cornhole, a permanent single-stall bathroom structure, native plantings with educational signs and a trailhead sign for the bridge connection to South Kiwanis Park, Wilson said.
Trustee Nicole Gilhooley asked about a lack of new lighting measures at the park, as there had “historically” been issues with people vandalizing the park after dark. Village President Michael Garvey said the lack of lighting should discourage people from entering the park after sunset, as all Brookfield parks are closed from dusk till dawn.
As the discussion moved to funding, Gundersen explained the village’s two options. The first option, which Gundersen recommended, would see Brookfield break the project into two funding phases, allowing it to apply for a second OSLAD grant next year which would be used toward the total cost.
Under this plan, Gundersen said, Brookfield would include bridge abutments on both sides of Salt Creek in the first phase and relegate the bridge itself to the second phase, meaning construction of the bridge could be delayed if the village obtains the first OSLAD grant but not the second. Brookfield would also have to include some extra amenities, like a fishing outcropping and a contemplation space, within the scope of the second phase to increase its competitiveness within the application process.
The second option would see Brookfield apply for grant funding for the entire project at once without any extra amenities. While this path would carry less risk for the village by minimizing the number of grant applications, it would lock Brookfield into building the bridge and leave the village with a higher overall price to pay.
The first option would cost about $2.7 million in total, but if Brookfield gets both OSLAD grants, it will only be on the hook for $1.5 million, split more or less equally into the two phases. The second option would cost $2.3 million in total, but Brookfield would have to pay $1.7 million even with the grant funding.
Village Manager Timothy Wiberg raised concerns about the cost of the bridge — which Wilson said is about $1 million itself — contributing to the high price tag of even the less expensive choice, but Gundersen and Wilson said that the bridge’s inclusion is vital to the project and grant application.
“The whole idea of this project is to increase the connectivity” between the two sides of Salt Creek,” Gundersen said. “We needed to include the bridge with the identified Creekside Park as the trailhead for that new amenity, [the] open-space area that we’ve been identifying as South Kiwanis Park.”
As trustees discussed the potential costs to the village for the project, which will only increase if Brookfield does not receive the OSLAD grants it hopes to, Assistant Village Manager Stevie Ferrari suggested the board consider whether the connectivity the bridge could provide would outweigh its cost and if Brookfield should even include the bridge in its grant application.
“If we submit this OSLAD grant as it’s being proposed right now, with the … the pedestrian bridge, we are kind of committing ourselves to completing that bridge in that second phase or sometime soon within the next three to four years because we’re putting those abutments in,” she said.
“If we do option one, phase one, and we invest [$]769,000 and we put in the bridge abutments, and phase two is not guaranteed to be funded by OSLAD or anything, the board might have the hard decision of, ‘Do we abandon the bridge idea?’” Garvey said. “If we don’t put in the bridge abutments or plan for the bridge now, let’s face it; we’re probably not going to put a bridge in at any point in the near future.”
After much discussion about the bridge and other proposed changes to Creekside Park, the board agreed to have village staff pursue the phased funding approach with bridge abutments in the first phase. Brookfield will plan to build the bridge later on, despite the uncertainty of how it will pay the costs down the line.
