Cliffview Park opens in south Macon neighborhood after $1.8 million improvements

An 84-year-old woman stood on a wooden dock Thursday, overlooking the same lake she used to fish at in south Macon during the 1950s.

LuReese Harbin, who now lives off North Mumford Road, recalled when she would trek up an untouched, shrub-filled cliff near the now called Cliffview Park, which has undergone about $1.8 million in completed renovations.

“Everything looks so different than it did, like what, 70 years ago,” Harbin said, walking through a newly built half-mile trail. “See, none of these trees were grown up like this when we’d come down here fishing … It was just low-growing shrubbery and cattail brush type stuff.”

Her aunt, Eva Bates, owned the property until she died in 1976, the year former President Jimmy Carter was elected, as Harbin put it.

She joined Macon-Bibb County officials at the 23-acre park’s grand opening and ribbon cutting at 663 Cliffview Drive Thursday morning. The project was under construction since May.

The park is snuggled behind a neighborhood near Houston Avenue, which is mostly low income and has been “crying out for assistance for a long time,” according to Alex Morrison, executive director of the Urban Development Authority and director of Planning and Public Spaces.

“Having a gem of a park… can be something divisive and can remove people from their neighborhood, reattach people to the place and can spark a neighborhood-led revitalization,” Morrison said.

A blighted house was demolished near the park’s entrance and replaced with a pavilion and picnic chairs, as part of Macon’s “Blight Fight” initiative.

The project was funded and approved by the Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax, and organized by the county, private contractors, First Choice Primary Care, Macon Area Habitat for Humanity and others.

Mayor Lester Miller said a free and safe park will help “stabilize” the community. It’s one step toward plans to increase affordable housing options and increase the local population nearby.

“We have a lot of blight around there. You don’t have housing, you don’t have investment, then you don’t have that neighborhood that can walk together to school and be that true community,” Miller said.

Macon resident and local Walmart employee Nulona Gordon, 39, lives near the park, but didn’t know it existed until recently. Gordon cast her rod at the lake on her day off.

“There’s not that much to do in Macon … but I’m going to bring my son here,” the New York native said. “He’s autistic so when I take him fishing, he’s like, ‘Mommy I understand why you go. It’s so calming and relaxing.”

This story was originally published November 1, 2024 at 6:00 AM.