Aurora council advances Central Community Park master plan; pond to be removed for naturalized wetland

The Aurora City Council on July 28 advanced a preliminary master plan for the 12‑acre Central Community Park in Ward 5, voting by unanimous consent to send the plan to a future regular council agenda, city staff said.

The plan would remove the existing pond and reconfigure the site into a naturalized wetland and open‑play areas while keeping courts and playground facilities, Trent Woolley, senior landscape architect with the Parks, Recreation and Open Space (PROS) Department, told the council at a study session.

Woolley said the pond “will be removed as part of this project” and that Aurora Water is directing that work. He described a new, more naturalized channel through the wetland area with several micro pools, walking trails, pedestrian bridges, a low‑water crossing and a small shelter. “That pond serves as an irrigation source only at this particular point in time,” Woolley added when asked how the change would affect irrigation.

The plan divides the site…