NLV to break ground Friday on 135-acre park

By Jeff Pope

Tuesday, April 28, 2009 | 1:59 a.m.

North Las Vegas officials will ditch sand wedges for shovels on Friday as the city closes the Craig Ranch Golf Course to make way for the Craig Ranch Regional Park.

Local golfers can tee off for one last round at the 47-year-old course at 9 a.m. on May 1. Following the game, city officials will break ground for the project that will turn the nine-hole golf course into a 135-acre regional park.

The ceremony is scheduled for 3:30 p.m.

The city purchased the golf course at 628 Craig Road, near Commerce Street, in 2005 to save it from being developed. It was purchased with funds granted by the Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act. The golf course’s conversion into a park is also being funded through the land act.

The city took possession of the Aliante Golf Course, which it will maintain as its municipal course after the Craig Ranch closure this week. The deal was part of the Aliante development agreement.

Trails will wind around the golf course's grassy fairways and shade trees and will connect to the Regional Las Vegas Wash Trail. The park will have a 3.5-acre children's play area, a dog park, picnic grounds with shade structures and water features, which should be completed with the first phase. That initial phase should be finished by 2010.

Bidding is underway for the first phase. The second phase is scheduled to start immediately after completion of the first phase.

The second phase will add ball fields, tennis and volleyball courts, a skate park, an expansion of the dog park and more play and picnic areas.

First settled as a ranch in 1905, the site was prone to flooding and was abandoned in 1925. George Craig, his wife and their four children took over the ranch in late 1927.

The Craigs and another family farmed the land for 31 years before they sold it to John Stimson, a Utah businessman, who turned the ranch into a golf course by the early 1960s.