Woods Park: A long-simmering debate over green space and the need for tennis courts

The debate over how best to use 49 acres of land in the middle of Lincoln began more than 70 years ago, shortly after Margaret Rogers offered it to the city in memory of her husband — and Frank H. Woods donated $65,000 to the city to buy it.

The deed, signed in 1948, said the land bounded by 33rd, O and J streets was to be used for public purposes and almost immediately the lines of debate were drawn: Should it be a sprawling green space in the heart of the city or the site of a civic auditorium? Park or school district athletic stadium?

The green space won out in those early debates and the land became Woods Park, with a 1954 master plan showing a swimming pool, tennis courts and a baseball field, all added in the 1960s.

Two decades later, Mary Anne and Gary Wells moved into a home about three blocks east of the park — around the same time a group known then as the Woods Park Tennis Corp. entered into an agreement with the city to enclose six outdoor courts in “bubbles” and build a modern clubhouse.

Neighbors called the bubbles an eyesore; tennis advocates said they offered everyone — not just people associated with private clubs — a chance to play tennis year-round.

So new lines of debate were drawn over a desire to expand those facilities and worries that expansion would come at the expense of urban green space.

The Wellses were among those who opposed previous expansions — at least twice since the bubbles were added — and now they’re spearheading opposition to the latest proposal that calls for not only an additional indoor facility but also more outdoor courts.

They started early — well before Friends of Woods Tennis, the non-profit that operates the Woods tennis facilities, submitted a formal request to the city in June.

“This time we decided to organize and show that it isn’t just a couple of concerned neighbors but a community,” Gary Wells said in an email.

Mary Kay Roth, who remembers pushing her now-grown children in strollers as she protested the bubbles, wrote a blog making the case for maintaining the existing green space.

She called it a turning point, a “milestone moment to decide whether we savor this park or continue to nibble away at it piece by piece, tree by tree.”

The Wellses said they heard of the plans in November 2021 and started a group called “Woods Park: Keep it Green.”

They and other residents in the neighborhood reached out to 200-some people interested in the environment and climate issues, asking them to help. They researched and made yard signs and created a Facebook page that now has 489 members. They worked with the Nebraska State Arboretum to get the park named a landscape affiliate site.

In addition to opposing the expansion plan, the group has planted 60-70 trees in the park — which has more than 750 — and helped revamp the pollinator gardens.

The city took note and decided to hire The Mediation Center to help navigate the two perspectives.

“I just knew from the energy we’d been receiving from the neighborhood that this would be quite a conversation,” said Lincoln Parks and Recreation Center Director Maggie Stuckey-Ross. “It is really important just because of the volume of voices we were hearing.”

Stuckey-Ross said she wants people to trust the parks department and feel city officials are being impartial and listening to all sides.

“Master plans are designed not only to set the vision for amenities in the park, but to ensure the ecological sustainability of the park,” she said. “So it matters. It is a big deal. We need to listen to all voices.”

The mediation process, which will start in earnest after Labor Day, will involve public meetings, and with neighborhood associations and the tennis center. Mediators will look for points of consensus and write a report with their conclusions — but not specific recommendations — for city officials.

Any changes to the Woods Park master plan require approval of both the parks and recreation advisory board and the City Council.

Members of Friends of Woods Tennis say the proposal is the second phase of a $6.3 million capital campaign that in 2017 resulted in a 90,000-square-foot building with six indoor courts that replaced the aging bubbles.

The second phase, included in the master plan update, was for four additional indoor courts.

But the plan didn’t account for the loss of three outdoor courts as a result of the new building, said Kevin Heim, executive director of Lincoln Tennis Center, nor steady growth of the program, so the plan was changed to add six more outdoor courts as well as additional parking.

Heim said indoor courts are operating at 84% capacity, more than twice the industry average, and there are waiting lists for school-year programs.

The expansion also would allow the facility to draw more and larger regional tournaments, driving tourism in Lincoln, Heim said.

If the plan comes to fruition, there will be a total of 15 outdoor courts (three more than now) and 10 indoor courts. The plan — which would include a $15 million capital campaign — also would include three indoor practice spaces, adjoining meeting rooms, locker rooms and bathrooms. A Lincoln Parks Foundation endowment would contribute $600,000 to replace the aging asphalt on the nine existing outdoor courts.

Heim and Todd Peterson, president of Friends of Woods Tennis, stress the rendering showing the new courts on the north end of the existing courts, along with extended parking, is just a starting point, and the final proposal could look different.

Heim said he wants to work with the neighborhood associations, and he began talking with them about the plans nearly two years ago, which was important to Peterson.

“We’ve always wanted to be a good steward and a good neighbor,” Peterson said.

The Wellses and other members of Keep it Green have suggested the tennis program expand to other parts of town or partner with Lincoln Public Schools to share their facilities.

“We are not against tennis. Many of our members play tennis and have utilized Woods tennis,” Gary Wells said. “Our concern is the open space and access to the park is being reduced to a point that it is no longer a park but a pay-for-use sports complex.”

Heim said the tennis program already offers programming at 35 sites across the community through its outreach programs that serve more than 2,000 non-paying players and it would be difficult to duplicate all the staffing and maintenance at another location.

He said the group's mission is to make tennis available to people of all abilities and income levels, and includes donating free racquets, $175,000 in scholarships and wheelchair programming. This year, the U.S. Tennis Association recognized the program as a National Junior Tennis and Learning Center.

Heim said that's why it's important to remain in the heart of Lincoln.

“We love being able to offer tennis, a lifetime sport for everyone, from the center of town,” Heim said. “And not just providing what’s oftentimes stereotyped as a country club sport for the few in only one portion of town.”

Marg Donlan, a longtime volunteer and president of the educational foundation, noted that a 2002 capital campaign made improvements to many areas of the park in addition to adding courts.

Members of Keep it Green say the new plan encroaches even farther on the park and they worry about the impact expanded parking would have on a row of oak trees along 33rd Street. They also fear the addition could result in the loss of up to 50 trees.

Because the master plan for Woods keeps changing, it's difficult for neighbors — or prospective neighbors — to know what to expect, said Mary Anne Wells.

“People that buy homes across from Woods Park believe they will be near a beautiful park that has been there since the 1950s,” she said. “They have no idea what is planned for the park’s future because there has never been a complete plan.”

The Wellses live where they do because of the park — their kids grew up playing tennis and baseball and swimming there, and today the couple walks through the paths that snake through the trees and green space.

Roth said that’s important, and worth keeping.

“If you cherish and value the specialness of having that kind of treasure in the middle of your city you shouldn’t let it go."