By Marvin G. Cortner
Editor

Several Osceola County building projects – including a new Historical Society museum, a nature center and a library – are moving forward with others on the just-completed list, according to information presented at a recent County Commission meeting.

Frank Anderson, general services division director, reported the county is “ready to move” on the $2.8 million renovation of the former Roadhouse Grill on West U.S. Highway 192 into a nature center for the Shingle Creek Regional Park and the new Osceola County Historical Society Museum to be built adjacent to the center.

The museum will replace the current facility off Bass Road in the Historical Society’s Pioneer Village.

“We are ready to start the pre-construction process,” Anderson said, adding that Historical Society representatives have already met with a consultant on how its exhibits would be laid out. "It would take seven to eight months to build this project.”

County officials along with those from the Osceola Library System, Anderson said, are meeting to narrow down options for the new West Osceola County Library in Celebration.

The Celebration library branch is now operating out of a building at 6070 W. U.S. Highway 192 and the new $3.5 million facility is planned for a site on Celebration Boulevard at Campus Street and Celebration Place, very near State Road 417.

Other projects Anderson mentioned were:

• Walk-N-Sticks Park improvements, for which ground was broken two weeks ago. Work on the 33.6-acre park off Buenaventura Boulevard in Buenaventura Lakes will take place in phases, with initial work to include a pedestrian pathway, a playground, restrooms, a pavilion, enhanced landscaping, irrigation, improved parking, an entrance sign, signage throughout the park and open green space.

Construction of the first phase is set to begin in mid-October with a budget of approximately $450,000. Initial work is expected to be completed by mid-January.

• County officials recently cut the ribbon for $2.4 million in improvements at the 28-acre Hickory Tree Park in St. Cloud. This county park is on Old Hickory Tree Road, behind Hickory Tree Elementary School.

Renovations to the park included new landscaping, enlargement of the stormwater retention pond, new parking areas with lighting, emergency access roads, sidewalks, chain-link fencing, a new 1,400-square-foot concession building with adjoining public restrooms, new bleachers (both for visitors and home fans), a new scoreboard, a press box with a field sound system, and the refurbishment of the existing football field, including new sod, irrigation and drainage, new goal posts and high-mast field lighting.

• Improvements to the 35-acre Holopaw Community Park, at 5220 Holopaw Road, also have been completed, at a cost of $1.13 million, with funding provided through a state grant. When additional funding becomes available, the park could be expanded with the addition of two ball fields, for which the grading work has already been completed. A jogging trail also would be built around the ball fields in an expansion.

• Renovation work at the Sheriff’s Office Fleet Maintenance Facility (the former Starling car dealership on East U.S. Highway 192, Kissimmee) has been completed, with a project cost of $838,000 (excludes land purchase). The move into the building has already started and when completed, it will house department offices, training rooms and county radio services.

• The county is finishing up downtown traffic studies in advance of building the 900-space parking garage planned for property adjacent to the rear of the Administration Building at Courthouse Square. Entrances to the garage would be off Emmett and Bryant streets.

The outside area of one side of the first floor of the garage could have retail spaces, Anderson said, adding that the top of the facility, if county officials so choose, could support a ‘solar farm” that could generate electricity for use in the garage and nearby county buildings.

According to Anderson, the county has accepted bids for the demolition of buildings in the footprint of the parking garage and once those buildings are razed, temporary parking areas would be built.