WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) -- The sound of fallen leaves crunching under your feet will soon be gone from parts of the Smith Creek Park Preserve.
A petition urging New Hanover County Commissioners to stop Phase 2 development of the Smith Creek Park Preserve, has garnered close to 1,500 signatures.
Phase 2 would involve paving several dirt walking paths and constructing a new parking lot, pavilion, and bathrooms.
Stephen Axthelm organized the petition, in part because of the location of these new facilities.
"We don't need it especially because this parking lot and stuff will go in about here and that is 1200 feet from the existing bathrooms and parking lot," Axthelm said. "So I mean, if you're going to put one in at all, that doesn't make much sense to put it there."
New Hanover County Parks and Gardens assistant director Andy Johnson said Phase 2 will help the park handle more visitors as the county continues to grow.
"We completed a master plan in 2017 that the community vocalized that they wanted to see more parks, green spaces, etc," Johnson said. "So we feel with the phase 2 expansion, that's going to address the growing needs for passive recreation."
County Commissioner Bill Rivenbark said the project will also make the preserve more compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act by allowing people with limited mobility to visit more areas of the preserve they couldn't access before.
But Axthelm said the preserve will lose some of its natural beauty due to this project.
"Everybody I've spoken to in here has been aghast when they hear that they're going to pave this all over. They're literally going to pave paradise and put up a parking lot. So imagine these trails are all going to be 8 feet wide, so we're going to lose some trees and this road's going to be 2 lanes so you're going to lose a lot of trees and that parking lot's for 40 cars is going to take out a lot of trees. It's just not the right thing to do."
Construction on the project is expected to start soon and will take between 9 months to a year to complete.
Regardless, Axthelm hopes this petition will cause commissioners to delay construction to gather more feedback.
He also plans to hire an attorney to file an injunction to keep construction from starting soon.