How residents clashed, then collaborated with city officials to save a beloved park

QUINCY ‒ In early 2022, when the city took control of Furnace Brook Golf Course, officials unveiled plans for a new clubhouse and parking lot that would eat into the woods and green space of a beloved neighborhood park.

Residents fought back, leading to a series of community meetings and revisions.

More than two years later, landscape architects have presented a new design that not only preserves the park's integrity but also improves walking paths, athletic courts and other amenities.

Commissioner of Natural Resources Dave Murphy told a standing-room-only audience at a meeting last month that in 25 years in government, he's held more community meetings on this project than any other.

Murphy thanked those in attendance for "rolling up their sleeves and participating," and credited Friends of Forbes Hill Park, the community advocacy group pressuring the city, for driving the process towards a better outcome.

"I think we're landing in good place due to their help," he said.

Forbes Hill Park: Beautiful views and a long history

Bordering Furnace Brook Golf Course, Forbes Hill Park sits atop one of Quincy's highest points outside of Blue Hills Reservation.

It boasts views of the Fore River Bridge, the ocean and Boston skyline, but its most unique feature is the Forbes Hill water tower, a 64-foot round standpipe built in the late 1890s. Made of Quincy granite, it has the look of an enchanted medieval castle.

The tower once stood next to a 280-by-100-foot concrete reservoir that stored about 5 million gallons of drinking water. In 1955, the reservoir, then out of use, was filled in after a drowning, according to the Massachusetts Historical Commission. Today it lies beneath the expansive lawn that Friends of Forbes Hill Park protected.

In addition to the tower, the park holds traces of a Little League diamond where kids play T-ball, a golfer's driving cage, a small basketball court, a fenced-in tennis court and a standalone slide and swing set. The city uses the park for youth recreational programs in the summer.

After a rocky start, advocates and city forge working relationship

The relationship between park advocates and the city was tense to begin with, as Murphy readily admits.

"The first iteration (of plans) was not received well," he said at the meeting. "That's an understatement."

The city first proposed paving most of the park to make a 107-space lot for a new and enlarged clubhouse. The initial design would have moved the new clubhouse up the hill from the site of the now-razed 1926 clubhouse towards a line of trees skirting the park, according to city documents.

Parking and new courts would have eaten up three fourths of the lawn, according to Friends of Forbes Hill Park founders Maria Mulligan and Dave Potter.

Murphy said the planners had intended to alleviate traffic concerns in the neighborhood by shifting parking into Forbes Hill Park.

Neighbors were outraged, and a group led by Mulligan and Dave Potter led a protest walk at the park attended by 50 residents in April 2022.

At the time, Potter described the protest as a grassroots movement to save the grass.

The movement led to a community meeting late in June 2022. The city agreed to move the clubhouse back to its original location, thus preserving the park as well as its perimeter of trees. Construction on the new clubhouse is underway, and city officials anticipate it will open in the fall.

"We were thrilled that they listened to us on that," Potter said. "That's the good story."

Meet Dave Potter, guardian spirit of Forbes Hill's trees

Potter, whose property touches the park, studied forestry at UMass Amherst and has become the unofficial guardian spirit of Forbes Hill. He told The Patriot Ledger that the neighborhood saved the park not just for themselves, but future generations, including his daughter and granddaughter.

Potter said that while the give-and-take with the city has been difficult at times, in general the city and Murphy have listened and responded, and many good things have come out of the complicated relationship.

One of the tenser moments came in January 2024, when contractors began preparing the site for the new clubhouse as well an enlarged road running from the parking lot down the hill to Summit Ave. The access road used to be a single-lane dirt road shaded by a leafy canopy.

Now it's wide open, Potter said. Workers are building paved road with parking on one side to serve golfers and patrons of the new clubhouse, as well as guests of the park. That required clearing a swath of trees along the side of the road.

"Man, they were going at it," Potter said. "The contractor had logging equipment. It wasn't a chipper and a bucket truck. It was the stuff you would use to clear out an acre of woods within a day."

One tree, which Potter described as a beautiful, 100-year-old oak, had an orange X spraypainted on it, singling it out for possible removal. That was too much for Potter.

"If they take it down, I'm going to stand next to until I get arrested," Potter remembered telling Murphy. In response, Murphy returned early from a vacation to supervise the tree cutting, according to Potter.

"He jumped on it as fast as he could," Potter said. "He's controlling it now."

In an email, Murphy wrote that the trees removed by contractors cleared space for a new ADA-compliant entrance to the park. Workers also removed saplings that had grown over a 100-year-old sewer line that the city will replace.

"We endeavored to save as many trees as possible and plan on planting 30 new native trees in the park as part of the park improvements," Murphy wrote.

Executive pay: Imagine getting a 79% pay raise. That's what the Quincy mayor is requesting

The New Year debate continues: Lunar New Year brouhaha: Turf war erupts between elected Quincy officials

Potter said he has since worked with Murphy and the city to establish an invasive species management committee made up of citizens who work to remove green briar, oriental bittersweet, poison ivy and other species that strangle trees.

Potter has personally cleared Forbes Hill Park of invasive vines, working every morning for two years to save the trees he loves. "Now it's pristine up there," he said. "The community really treasures the place.

"That was cool," Potter said. "That came out of it too."

How much the improvements cost, and where the money will come from

In the spring of 2023, Friends of Forbes Hill Park requested a landscape architect for the project, Mulligan said. The city agreed and hired Horsley Witten Group, an engineering consultant. In the meantime, about $250,000 was secured from the Community Preservation Commission for work on the courts, playground equipment and the planting of 30 trees.

In June 2023, Quincy's city council approved a $13.9 million bond to fund construction of the new clubhouse. That appropriation included $100,000 specifically for the park, Murphy said.

But Mulligan said that more funding is needed to implement Horsley Witten's plans because inflation has eaten into the purchasing power of the original CPC grant.

"(The city) is spending $14 million on the other side of the fence," she said, referring to the clubhouse. "Could they have funded some other stuff for us? A lot of people are frustrated that even though (city officials) did change their approach, they didn't back it up with funding."

She said it's good that the city agreed to prioritize the park over clubhouse parking and hire a landscape architect, but it remains to be seen if it will fund Horsley Witten's plans and when they will be executed.

In an email, Murphy told The Patriot Ledger that the CPC grant and $100,000 from the the clubhouse bond would fulfill most plans presented by the landscape architects. Gardens and other plantings scheduled for the fall will likely require other funding sources, Murphy wrote, and may draw from the department's operating budget.

End of an era: Eviction court case of 77-year-old Wheelhouse Diner is settled. What happened

Quincy schools: With Celtics' assist, Quincy schools put full court press on chronic absenteeism

What would the improved Forbes Hill Park look like?

The plan presented by Horsley Witten does not change the park's layout but adds features to improve its accessibility and aesthetic, according to landscape architect Hannah Carlson.

The design will make it clearer how to enter the park and access its amenities. For instance, the basketball and tennis courts would be shifted to make way for a more formal entrance," Carlson said. The playground, which now consists of a single slide and swing set, would be enlarged, while preserving as much open lawn as possible.

Benches and picnic tables would be added and oriented towards the park's many views of the water and skyline, and mid-sized canopy trees would be added for shade in the hot summer months, when children's programs use the park, Carlson said.

A number of new paths would link the courts, playground, tower and three entrances. Steps would approach the tower itself, which would be encircled by ornamental trees, according to the plans. Existing steps leading up from Summit Avenue would be replaced by a meandering footpath bordered by a drainage swale to manage stormwater running down from the hilltop.

What's being done in and around Forbes Hill Park now? New courts and drainage improvements

City workers have already begun removing the existing athletic courts, which will be shifted and rebuilt, Murphy said in an email. Crews will begin preparing the ground for the new courts next week to be followed by paving and painting. Murphy said he expects work to be done by the first week of July, when a summer youth program run by the city's recreation department begins.

A lot of work in and around the park has to do with stormwater management. At the meeting, city engineer Paul Costello described how increasingly intense rains and the hill's unique topography and soil composition create flooding issues for the park and residents.

The city has already built artificial drainage swales, or vegetated basins, to catch stormwater coming off the park that would otherwise sheet into yards on Summit Avenue, Murphy wrote in an email.

In addition, the new parking lot will include a number of catch basins and underground drainpipes, whereas the old lot had none, Murphy wrote.

Peter Blandino covers Quincy for The Patriot Ledger. Contact him at pblandino@patriotledger.com.

Thanks to our subscribers, who help make this coverage possible. If you are not a subscriber, please consider supporting quality local journalism with a Patriot Ledger subscription. Here is our latest offer.

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Quincy officials and city residents collaborate on Forbes Hill Park