The $19 million park in Mercer County that nobody wants

This must have been awkward. The Mercer County Park Commission presented and approved a plan to take a large piece of natural land and spend over $19 million clearing and cleaning and creating a kayak launch and walkways and playgrounds. The problem? Many don't want it. Oops!

According to NJ.com, it's an area known as Dam Site 21. 279 acres bought by Mercer County all the way back in 1979. The plan then was to turn the area into water management dam and park. None of it ever happened. For all these years, there it sat.

Some spoke up at a public meeting to say they enjoyed the area exactly as it was, purely natural, and want it left that way. Others are concerned about overdeveloping a natural area that is an animal habitat. Still more complained the county would probably not manage the land and keep it clean any better than they have (or haven't) for decades. Still more said they were worried about traffic.

NJ.com reports a lot of the issues were taken into consideration in finalizing a plan which apparently would not be denied. It passed unanimously and moves on in the process to engineering and design.

Let's hope things go better than they did in 1979.

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