ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. — St. Johns County just broke ground on its first park in more than a decade. It’s located at 4881 SR 16, just east of Pacetti Road.
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“In this area of the county, we don’t really have a facility like this at all,” says Ryan Kane, director of the county’s parks and recreation department.
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Within the next year, the mud pile currently sitting on the Mill Creek property will become:
- A multipurpose field
- Two baseball fields
- Two softball fields
- Four batting cages
The $12 million park is addressing a sore need for families and sports clubs struggling to find this kind of space.
“If they could rush those fields, it would be nice,” says Richard Jones, treasurer of the Villages Baseball Association, “all the leagues in St. Johns County are struggling to find field space.”
The Villages Baseball Association is the only recreational sports club in central St. Johns County. It has more than 400 kids on their teams, but only three fields for them to play on.
As more families move to the area, Jones says they don’t have room for everyone.
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“Families that don’t get in are basically heartbroken that their kids aren’t getting to play,” Jones says.
The county says all of its recreational clubs are at full capacity and can’t take on any more kids looking to pick up a sport. It’s come to the point where, Kane says, most are having to turn families away.
“They’re full, beyond capacity, there’s not enough space to get the play in,” Kane says.
And for the kids who can play, it’s not easy for all of them to make it to practice. In central St. Johns, for example, it takes 20 minutes to drive between the new Mill Creek park and the Villages Baseball fields. But for families living in the World Golf Village area, it can take half an hour or more going one way.
“Our goal is to have everyone that wants to participate be able to participate, unfortunately, that’s just not the situation we’re in right now,” Jones says.
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Providing relief for these sports clubs is becoming a priority for the county. Kane says the county’s already designing four more parks.
“This [park at Mill Creek] is the first of a multitude of steps for the county to catch up to this growth,” Kane says.
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The Mill Creek park is expected to open by October 2024.
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