By Mayor Mark Sheldon
Happy new year to all! I trust that you are enjoying a prosperous and positive 2024 thus far.
The City of Panama City Beach is looking forward to a successful year, and I am especially excited to share that we have begun our improvements and enhancements to Frank Brown Park. In 2023, with your support, the City Council approved a comprehensive master plan which is a roadmap for revitalizing and expanding this landmark park. The adopted plan reflects your voices, your needs and your aspirations for our City.
The master plan is part of a collaborative journey to enhance and add new amenities to our largest and most popular park, which celebrated 40 years of existence in 2023. This park is a community gem and a place of shared experiences. It’s where your kids learned to swim. It’s where you hit your first home run. It’s where your daughter reveled in being a mermaid one summer. And it’s where your grandmother goes to exercise with her peers. This park is the heart of our growing and amazing community.
One of the first projects we started this year was the reconfiguration of the key connector road which connects the entrance of Frank Brown Park at Mandy Lane to North Pier Park Drive. As part of this construction, and to keep everyone safe, this road is temporarily closed Monday through Friday to allow for uninterrupted construction. We want to meet our May 1 construction timeline for completion.
Straightening out the curve in this road will allow us to address traffic flow issues and enable us to make better use of existing land to add new features like a skate park, which is planned for the future. This redesigned roadway will offer park visitors a safer, more user-friendly navigation pathway.
This will also allow for the construction of much-needed restrooms and a pavilion for special-needs athletes utilizing the Miracle League Field, and for the construction of a new handicap-accessible paved parking lot. All of these amenities are long overdue for these special citizens.
But the City’s vision goes beyond recreation. We are investing in the health and well-being of our community through the rehabilitation of our four tennis courts. The Rob Carlson Tennis Courts are hard-surface courts that require resurfacing every 5-10 years. This project, which was approved by the City Council in January and is expected to start very soon, also includes new lighting and fencing. These courts are a vital amenity of the park, providing the public free access to tennis facilities along with structured lessons and summer camps. This renewed space offers an opportunity for friendly competition and exercise.
Making these necessary enhancements – and there are more coming, including new basketball and pickle ball courts – truly prepares the park for the future. While brick and mortar in nature, these are solid investments in the community and in the quality of life for all our residents.
The success of such projects, the success of our community, hinges on your continued engagement. I urge you to remain involved, share your ideas, and support the future of our community. We know memories are made on the World’s Most Beautiful Beaches, and many of them begin with a glove and ball at Frank Brown Park.
