The 20/30 Park on Pine St, soon to be Called Da’ Yas Park is in for a Major Makeover this Spring

Da'Yas Park project plan. Courtesy of The City of Eureka.

The City of Eureka was recently awarded a $6.3 million grant from California State Parks to completely renovate this historic park and make it into something everyone can enjoy. Environmental Project Manager of the City of Eureka, Robin Praszker explained the plans and process of the newly renovated park. 

“We realized we had an opportunity to consult with the community about the identity of the park,” Praszker said. “Through that process, it was identified that the community liked the idea of a new name, so we went through that process with the community.”

The Wiyot tribe has also been involved throughout the process of the upcoming revitalized park including the new name change.

“We had hundreds and hundreds of names within there, we saw a lot of comments about including the Wiyot tribe in their native language, we also saw a lot of names relevant to the neighborhood; Cypress Park was one of the ones in there,” Praszker said. “We tried to provide the best translation possible for cypress, which was ‘Yas.’” 

The park will have many opportunities for the community to learn about Wiyot culture. 

“That’s another thing we plan to interpret through the park project is talking about their language, what they know of it, where the gaps are and why they do have to provide, say, best translations rather than the exact translation, because information has been lost so there’ll be a lot of opportunity to teach,” Praszker said.

It also includes a watershed themed all-inclusive playground, multi-use sports courts, new parking and restrooms, art installations, accessible pathways, and much more. 

“The park will be almost unidentifiable from its previous form, through the park design process we hired a professional park design firm, and through that process, a watershed theme was identified,” Praszker said. “Not only does it kind of tug at the heartstrings of our local ecology, but we can also learn through play and begin to interpret the importance of the watersheds in Eureka and throughout Humboldt County.”

Construction starts in spring and will be completed by the end of 2023.

“There’s a lot of children in the neighborhood and there’s been a lack of playground facilities within the immediate vicinity for a long time,” Praszker said. “We kind of expect this to be the premier playground of the area once we’re done with it.”

For more information visit: 2030parkimprovements.com

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