When Mary Eliot moved to Columbia in 2004, she knew a park would be built behind her house.

At the time, she was satisfied with the plan for Blandair Regional Park, which would put a playground and a picnic area on the parkland closest to her house on Sealed Message Road in Long Reach.

But recent changes to the park plan call for lighted sports fields and a skatepark in the section of the park closest to Eliot's home, where she lives with her husband and their 2-year-old son.

And Eliot is not happy.

"It's been redesigned to the point that it's a completely different park," she said. "Now, what was meant to be a dawn-to-dusk park all of the sudden has features that would impact families beyond the work day."

Eliot said she and some of her neighbors are frustrated that the park plan has been altered to put more facilities in the park's southeastern area, nearest their back yards.

The plans for Blandair Regional Park, which will span 300 acres of former farmland in east Columbia, have been in the works since the county purchased the land in the late 1990s. An advisory committee of residents and county officials first approved a master plan for the park in 2003.

The park, which straddles Route 175, is to include nature trails, an environmental education area, playing fields, picnic shelters, playgrounds and a restored historic manor house.

Earlier this year, county officials reconvened the 23-member committee of residents to reevaluate the master plan with the assistance of a design consultant.

Gary Arthur, director of the county's Department of Recreation and Parks, said changes to the plan were necessary to account for the land's topography, access points and easements, and are part of an ongoing process to prepare for the eventual construction of the park.

"The revisions, the tweaking were always intended," Arthur said. "We've been trying to let the public know, but it seems that we're always accused of not providing sufficient notification."

Change in the plans

The changes, dubbed "Refinement D," include shifting some playing fields from the northern portion of the park to the southern portion, adding a skateboard park in the southeast corner of the park and adding an access road to the park from Route 175 that would include an overpass, Arthur said.

Shifting the fields was necessary to avoid grading land along a utility easement in the northern portion of the park and to position playing fields closer to Oakland Mills High School, Arthur said.

Committee members considered two locations for the access road on the southern portion of the park, including a new road along the southeastern perimeter of the park or extending the existing Oakland Mills Road, which would run through the center of the park.

In a July 30 vote conducted via e-mail, committee members approved "Refinement D" 18-2, with one abstention, Arthur said. Members also voted down the proposed perimeter road in favor of using Oakland Mills Road, he added.

Cathy Latham, a committee member from Oakland Mills, said she opposed the southeastern perimeter road and a park entrance off of Timesweep Lane, on the southwestern side of the park, based on feedback from area residents.

"I approve of the plan overall, but there are details to be worked out: noise, lights and access points," she said.

The latest version of the Blandair park master plan will be presented at a meeting Sept. 11 at 7 p.m. at Oakland Mills High School. The meeting will include a period for public comments.

Protest petition circulated

Meanwhile, Eliot said she and her neighbors are circulating a petition outlining their opposition to the changes in the plan.

"We feel like we haven't had a voice," she said. "For me, I feel that the process has been short-circuited."

Residents of the Emerson Hill and Cinnamon Tree communities, on the southwestern side of the park, also have circulated a petition asking county officials to reevaluate a proposed park entrance off of Timesweep Lane, in Oakland Mills.

The petition drive, organized by Emerson Hill homeowners association president Jonathan Mayhew, states that the entrance road could lead to increased traffic and potentially dangerous turns in and out of the neighborhood.

"The plan for Blandair Park will already put a lot of noise, lights and crime in our backyards, so our community does not want the same in our front yards as well with an entrance off of Timesweep," Mayhew stated in the petition.

Arthur said the Blandair plan has drawn criticism from residents at every stage.

"It runs the gamut," he said of residents' feedback. "We get everything from, 'We don't want it; don't change it,' to 'This is going to be a great amenity for the east side of Columbia.'"

The master plan is posted on the parks department's Web site, at www.co.ho.md.us/RAP.

Overall, the park is expected to cost between $18 million and $25 million and be completed in roughly a decade, Arthur said, adding that the project has received $3 million in funding from the state and county to date.

Before construction, the plan must be approved by the Recreation and Parks board, the county Planning Board and the county executive and County Council, through the county's budget process.

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