A new park that recently opened on the northern edge of the Rillito River is one of the most diverse and comprehensive in Pima County's system, county officials say.
It's also one that is taking some time to get noticed, despite its prime location.
The 55-acre Brandi Fenton Memorial Park at Binghampton Rural Historic Landscape officially opened to the public earlier this month. There hasn't been much word of mouth about the park, though. That factor, combined with ongoing road construction all around the park, has left the complex's many amenities virtually untouched.
"I know that once the word gets out there, the park is going to get a lot of use," said Jon Fenton, father of the park's namesake, Brandi Fenton, a 13-year-old girl who was killed in a car accident in March 2003.
"I think it (the road construction) still sort of precludes some people from using it."
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Nancy Cole, an architect with Pima County Parks and Recreation, said the park's main entrance, at East River Road and North Alvernon Way, often has barricades in front of it while construction crews continue to work on extending Alvernon over the Rillito to connect it with a realigned River Road.
Those barricades have both helped and hurt the park, Cole said.
"People going west on River are sometimes driving through into the park, thinking they are still on River," Cole said, citing one instance when a driver entered the park at a speed much higher than the 10 mph posted just inside the entrance and ended up running over a small tree.
"We've had some issues with that. It's very awkward for new users," Cole said
A second entrance to the park, on the west side of North Dodge Boulevard just south of Alvernon, is not barricaded but provides access only to a smaller parking lot meant to serve visitors to the park's covered basketball courts, the dog park and the easternmost of the three fields for soccer and football.
The park also has three access points from the Rillito River Park, a linear park that spans both sides of the river from North La Cholla Boulevard to North Craycroft Road. But fencing has blocked off those entrances until work is completed on the Alvernon bridge.
Cole said she thinks that work will be done within the next two months, and after that it's only a matter of time before area residents discover all that Brandi Fenton Memorial Park has to offer.
"It could attract more than just users from around the area," Cole said, noting that it's the only park in Pima County's system that has either equestrian facilities or a splash park.
The park also includes a visitor center, which is housed in one of the five historic structures preserved to showcase the history of the area, known as Binghampton.
The visitors center will host a variety of shows, Cole said. The first is an exhibit by the Southern Arizona Watercolor Guild that is now under way and will continue through next Thursday.
"We've set it up as a mini-gallery," Cole said.
Jon Fenton, whose family helped to create a foundation to raise $1.5 million of the estimated $7 million cost to build the park, said he believes the park is a place his daughter would have enjoyed.
"She loved the outdoors, so she absolutely would have loved to hang out there," Jon Fenton said. "It's a very diverse park, so I think you're going to get a very broad range of users. It's the best use of that area."
