Designed for the Eye

Useful and utilized amenities in parks are important to the community, but so are design aesthetics. Gateway Park in Sunny Isles Beach places an equal emphasis on both.

Located on Sunny Isles Boulevard just west of Collins Avenue, this five-acre city gathering spot strikes a balance between natural beauty and man-made offerings. According to The Trust for Public Land, Gateway Park serves 8,945 residents living within a 10-minute walk of the park and its size is listed as 3.7 acres.

The Biscayne Times first visited gateway Park in late July, but was prevented from walking the grounds as the entrance was locked up. Signs on the property as well as the city website stated that it was open again after being closed due to COVID-19. A month later I checked online and found new, odd pandemic hours finally posted: open daily 9 a.m. to noon (closed Tuesdays) and 4 – 8 pm. Seniors priority hours are Monday, Wednesday and Friday 8 – 9 a.m.

Pay-by-phone parking is available next door in the Gateway Parking Garage for $2.75 for one hour/$4 for two hours, and the community shuttle service makes regular stops in front of the park on Sunny Isles Beach Boulevard. In pre-COVID times, children 12 and under could bring their bikes and scooters to the park on Tuesdays from 4 – 8 p.m. Visitors can walk down the lovely palm-shaded pink brick sidewalk and up the stairs to the large open bricked plaza decorated with its own towering palms, and enter by the community center at the west end of the park that is now under renovation.

Like most Sunny Isles Beach parks, there is an interactive SmartLink kiosk, free Wi-Fi, and a solar-powered outdoor Soofa Bench charging station with USB connections, but unfortunately it is currently dismantled, perhaps due to pandemic safety restrictions. The city website states there are restrooms in the park, perhaps located in the community center. The entire park is elevated approximately 4 feet above street level, helping to make it flood resistant.

Inside the plaza on the north end is an interactive water feature with fountains, which is currently shut down, again in response to current health and safety regulations. Inside the park proper, a new children’s playground is also closed and sectioned off with flexible orange construction fencing. It features fantastical electric blue slides and climbers with matching overhead canvas shades, and a Rapunzel-like fairytale castle which looks like great fun to explore. The two-toned rubberized safety flooring will help protect little knees when we all get back to normal one day.

The most striking visual at Gateway Park is its symmetrical English garden-esque design. A large rectangular grassy community gathering space is first edged with a metal-grated drain to add to the resiliency of the high elevation. In turn, the drain is framed with an approximately 15-foot-wide gray brick promenade. Metal picnic tables, encased in plastic wrap to prevent picnickers during the pandemic, are placed every 30 feet along the inside of the promenade. In between tables are young oak trees surrounded by ferns that will create a wonderful canopy of shade in future years. Night lighting and metal trash cans are also methodically installed along the path.

Visitors can stroll down to the eastern edge of the park to the huge open-air elevated performance stage, which in safer times hosts concerts for Sunny Isles music lovers. From most vantage points within the property, concertgoers have a perfect view of the stage. Gateway LIVE! Stages quarterly productions and Music in the Isles is an annual jazz festival scheduled annually in November. Last December’s Holiday Concert featured the South Florida Youth Symphony Orchestra.

Behind the stage is perhaps the best part of Gateway Park: a huge butterfly garden with hundreds of host and nectar plants supporting many species of the insect including sulphur, iulia, Gulf fritillary, zebra and monarch, as well as berry-producing plants that feed local birds that soar in for visits. There are two entrances to the garden, and plants are thoughtfully arranged on both sides of a narrow concrete footpath that winds around the enchanting space.

Two sculptures grace the garden. On the north side is the large terra cotta “Unity Statue” with a bronze plaque that reads, “This statue depicts women of all walks of life united by ties of camaraderie, compassion, and courage.” The art was donated by Jack and Ofri Cohen, in memory of their son Eido. On the garden’s south side is a bronze bust of Cuban-born Sunny Isles Beach visionary builder José Milton, mounted on a marble block.

The garden also has two niches along its footpath for special benches. One bench is installed on a brick foundation in which a large decorative cloisonné Taiwanese seal of the city of Hengchun, sister city of Sunny Isles Beach, is embedded. The bench bears a plaque written in English and Mandarin to celebrate the two cities’ relationship. The second niche for a bench is currently under construction.

Miami-Dade County Parks, Recreation, and Open Spaces announced in late August that in partnership with the Florida Inland Navigation District (FIND) a new public survey would be released to give county residents the chance to be a part of the development of the Water Recreation Access Plan (WRAP).

According to the county’s press release, the plan is meant “to improve public access to our waterways, while protecting the marine environment and waterfront businesses, increasing recreational and eco-tourism opportunities, implementing adaptations for climate change, and expanding connectivity to the bay.” The WRAP initiative is one piece of the 2008 Miami-Dade County Parks and Open Space Master Plan (OSMP).

Public input is important in ensuring that residents’ needs are met. Be a part of the discussion by sharing your input online; take the survey at www.surveymonkey.com/r/wrapsurvey2020 by Oct. 6. Additional public outreach efforts will be made in the future.