Bittersweet Park 2022

Thank you to everyone that shared their feedback, stopped by one of our pop-up events to chat, and/or took the online survey for Bittersweet Park. Over 1,400 surveys were collected from residents all across Greeley, and beyond. The survey is now closed. Survey results will be used to help the city determine the next steps for this park.

Greeley City Council Work Session Presentation - April 12

Bittersweet Park Update

Following several weeks of feedback and community input about the 2020 Bittersweet Park irrigation and landscape updates, Greeley City Council came to a consensus to make additional modifications. At its work session on Tuesday, April 12, Council directed City staff to convert the areas surrounding the Weld County Veterans and Fallen Officers memorials, approximately 5.6 acres, back to bluegrass. The conversion will allow better access to the sites for annual events, improve aesthetics along 35th Avenue, and keeps the existing irrigation system. City staff will now look at budgeting for the project and the timeline for installation of the new grass around the memorials. Watch the video to hear the full discussion.

The Bittersweet Park irrigation and turf conversion project started as scheduled in 2020. The irrigation components and new soft surface trail are complete. Seeding and reseeding work will continue for the next several growing seasons. We appreciate the public’s patience during the construction and disruption during the project. The project is not over yet as it takes several growing seasons to establish native grasses, but the most disruptive construction work has been completed.

Questions and concerns may be directed to parks@greeleygov.com or 970-350-9390.

See the Bittersweet Park StoryMap

Bittersweet Park Project History

In early 2019 the City of Greeley hired the landscape architecture team of Matrix Design group to help lead three community outreach and engagement sessions aimed at identifying opportunities for water conservation and site amenity improvements at Bittersweet Park. At thirty years old, the irrigation system had become inefficient and was experiencing failure. Park staff felt this was a unique opportunity to partner with water resource teams and Greeley citizens to implement water conservation measures and identify park improvement opportunities. Greeley residents chose to implement a water conservation project that will convert 21 acres of high water use turf grass to alternative varieties that once established, will reduce water consumption, improve urban habitat, reduce maintenance hours and add additional pathway improvements throughout the park. It is not surprising that residents chose an aggressive approach given that Greeley has been a leader in water conservation for many years.

Work began as scheduled in the spring of 2020 and by fall of 2020 the irrigation system has been completed and the first seeding of the site has been completed.  Throughout the fall of 2020 and into the future, work crews will monitor native seed growth and reseed where necessary.  Additionally, as with all seeding projects, weeds will continue to be a nuisance until the native grasses are well established.  There is no set amount of time for the native grasses to become established; however, the average length of time in a semi-arid climate such as Greeley is 3-5 growing seasons.  The first season, in this case, 2020, will be the most noticeable season for weed growth, but as work crews cut and remove weeds and reseed the native grasses, each season will have fewer weeds and larger stands of native grasses until they choke out the weed species across much of the site.

Please see the FAQs above for more answers to common landscape conversion questions about this project.

Proposed Changes

Taking into consideration the public's opinions, we have come up with the following preferred conversions for Bittersweet Park.

Visual Changes

A City of Greeley Parks and Water Conservation Project