Paris expands premier park with new triple-tower slide
PARIS, Tenn. — One of West Tennessee’s most iconic cities is working to expand, and they kicked the expansion off in a fun way.
“It’s kind of our cream to crop, our premier park already with the Eiffel tower, it already has a natural draw,” Mayor Carlton Gerrell said.The Eiffel Tower Park in Paris is an icon, but the tower isn’t the only attraction.
“We’ve been wanting to have an additional attraction at our pool for quite some time and we were able to make it happen,” Parks Director Tony Lawrence said.
The city of Paris added three slides as the first phase of the park expansion, and it has everyone excited.
“We realized that the slide was a reasonable option for phase one and we were able to jump on it, act on it and make it available,” Lawrence said.
But the slides are just the first of many additions the city is proposing.
“Change up some of the things that are maybe not as popular as they used to be, so new types of things that are more family friendly, expand the parking, things like that,” Mayor Carlton
Gerrell said.
They are also looking to add paved walkways, a pump track, a low-ropes course, and ADA accessible walkways.
“Really one of the things I’m most excited about is the potential to put a huge splash pad in. It will include pavilions, bathrooms, and pergolas, really pretty, the plans we have come up with thus far,” City Manager Kim Foster said.
City leaders said this type of expansion would complement fishing and ball tournaments, as well as draw more people to the area.
“If we grew it, improved it, added some neat features that maybe not everybody has, hopefully it would not only be a great piece for our community, but it would draw people in from surrounding communities and be a local attraction and help our local economy,”Foster said.
The city has mock-ups that show what the city is looking to accomplish, and they say with the right plan, it helps finding the money a lot easier.
“You’ve got to have a plan in order to start applying for grants, so we’ve got a good plan,” the mayor said,
“So one of the reasons we went ahead and put the slides in on our own, with our own money, was so that when we do go to apply for a grant we can say look, we have a plan, we know where we want to go, here it is laid out and we have taken the first steps without asking for anybody else’s money,” Foster said.
City officials said they are shooting for this to be a three to five year project,
