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Improvements planned for Mt. Lebanon’s Robb Hollow Park

By Harry Funk staff Writer hfunk@thealmanac.Net 3 min read
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Plans for improving Robb Hollow Park are moving forward.

A majority of Mt. Lebanon commissioners agreed to pursue a concept, developed and recommended by the municipal parks advisory board, that provides for amenities while also addressing what to do with a massive pile of soil that has accumulated during renovations at the adjacent public works facility.

As presented at the commissioners’ Feb. 26 discussion session, the Robb Hollow project calls for the shaping of the pile to produce a gradual slope and a flat area of about .4 acres on top, at an estimated cost of $163,000.

Mt. Lebanon’s 2018 budget allocated $132,000 for the “greening” of the southern end of the park, near the intersection of Cedar Boulevard and Painters Run Road.

About $125,000 of that amount remains, assistant municipal manager Ian McMeans said, because of costs involved with bidding out the project last year. The commission rejected the bids as being too high.

The pile created by the public works project is higher than anticipated primarily because stone has been used to backfill a replaced pipe instead of the soil that was excavated, according to Alberto Jarquin of Gateway Engineers.

Commissioner Kelly Fraasch disparaged a lack of communication with elected officials regarding the growing size of the pile.

“Yes, I’m supportive of seeing this,” she said about Robb Hollow concept. “I think the parks advisory board has worked very hard in trying to fix a mistake. But we still are in a situation in which we are paying out a lot of money for a mistake of such a large magnitude.”

She suggested that funds be diverted from the public works project to pay for park improvements. Andrew McCreery, municipal director of finance, said money potentially could be available in the project’s contingency fund to account for the added expense.

Parks advisory board member Elaine Kramer said that one of the objectives in developing the recommended concept was to keep costs in line.

“We were trying to think of a solution that sort of split the difference, that wasn’t removing everything but was trying to find some use for that big pile of dirt,” she told commissioners. “It’s not good soil. It costs a lot to move it away. We’re not happy that it’s there. I, personally, am really mad that it’s there.”

To make the best of it, the plan is to place amenities at the top such as a small shelter with picnic tables, nature interaction area, swings, benches and “maybe a fire pit, should that be within code,” Kramer said.

Commissioner Steve Silverman said he talked with public works director Rudy Sukal about the financial aspect.

“We think people can donate some trees and so forth,” Silverman said. “The hope is that it doesn’t go up totally to that top-end number, because there may be some contributions to be made.”

Citing financial concerns, Commissioner Craig Grella said he is not in favor of the project.

“The amount of money on this above and beyond the budget we allocated for it, in my opinion, is better spent in other areas in the municipality,” he said, citing storm-water management improvements as an example.

The Robb Hollow project must go before the Mt. Lebanon Planning Board, which next meets March 19, because of its ties to the public works upgrades, McMeans explained.

“This would be changing the grading and layout of that southern end of the site that was part of an already-approved land development plan.”

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