People interested in the history and ecology of Lexington came downtown Sunday to learn more about Town Branch Commons, the proposed downtown park that would follow the path of the city’s historic water source.

The park would include much of Town Branch, the creek that runs beneath downtown Lexington. The park would be a network of pools, fountains and rain gardens stretching from the Isaac Murphy Memorial Garden at East Third Street and Midland Avenue to Cox Street near Rupp Arena.

Gena Wirth, the design principal for SCAPE/Landscape Architecture of New York, which won an international competition to design Town Branch Commons, said the event was designed to let people envision the park.

“If you don’t know it’s there, you can’t get excited about what it could be,” Wirth said. “Town Branch is this kind of hidden, unseen thing, and this event is helping kick-start awareness about Town Branch and the role we all play in helping preserve and maintain quality water systems.”

Claire Carpenter, a retired University of Kentucky employee who described herself as “somewhat over 60,” said she has been following “the possibilities of bringing Town Branch back to daylight for a while.”

“Plus, I’m a biker, so this seemed like a natural to come bike the route of the underground stream,” Carpenter said. “I think it would be wonderful to take a dirty old stream and culvert and turn it into a city asset.”

Town Branch starts near the Smucker plant on Winchester Road where Jif peanut butter is made, Lexington architect Van Meter Pettit said during a walking tour from Midland Avenue to a parking lot across Vine Street from the Transit Center. Lexington was founded on the banks of Town Branch, a tributary of the South Elkhorn.

The creek “was an open waterway along the railroad,” Pettit said. “It probably was not full at all times, but it surged especially in wet weather. It generally came out of springs.”

After flooding in the 1920s and ’30s, Town Branch was paved over and covered by streets. Pointing to blue manhole covers along Midland Avenue, Pettit said: “All these storm sewers go directly to Town Branch, but now it’s all culverted. What we call Town Branch is just a system of culverts where we are standing now. It’s not until you get to the back of Rupp Arena” that Town Branch returns to the daylight.

Projects in Seoul, South Korea, and Yonkers, N.Y., have brought stretches of urban waterways back into the public light, Wirth said.

Trent Garrison, who teaches geology at Eastern Kentucky University, attended Sunday’s event to learn more about the groundwater system and the future of Lexington.

Garrison, 38, of Lexington said he would be interested in biking on the Town Branch path.

“We bike quite a bit, and it would be great not only for us but friends of ours who are interested in the same thing,” he said.

Blue Grass Community Foundation has begun a campaign to raise $50 million to build and maintain Town Branch Commons. This month the Urban County Council approved spending $180,000 to hire the foundation to spearhead the private fundraising.

Lexington council approves agreement to launch Town Branch Commons donation drive

In addition to private fundraising, the city is seeking a $13 million federal grant that would be matched by $10 million from the city and nearly $1 million from LexTran.

The city is poised to give $180,000 to the Blue Grass Community Foundation to lead efforts to raise millions of dollars for Town Branch Commons, a new linear downtown Lexington park that will connect the city’s core to its rural landscape.

As part of its general fund budget of more than $323 million, the city set aside $10 million in bond money for the 2.5-mile linear park, which is to have a network of pools, fountains, rain gardens and pocket parks stretching from Isaac Murphy Memorial Art Garden on East Third Street to Cox Street near Rupp Arena.

The park will include much of Town Branch, the creek that mostly runs beneath downtown Lexington.

The $180,000 is from the general fund and is in addition to the $10 million in bond money.

Some members of the Urban County Council questioned the $180,000 allocation at Tuesday’s council work session. It will come up for a final vote in coming weeks.

Councilwoman Jennifer Mossotti questioned why the city was spending money to get money. The $180,000 is just for this fiscal year, which ends June 30, 2016. It’s not clear how much the city will have to pay Blue Grass for private fundraising in future years, Mossotti said.

“I think that’s a lot of money,” Mossotti said. “It just doesn’t seem to be best business practice to go that way.”

City officials defended the cost, saying it was needed to raise money.

“We are basically contracting with the Blue Grass Foundation to cultivate fundraising efforts,” said Jamie Emmons, chief of staff for Mayor Jim Gray.

The goal is to raise $50 million in private donations.

Emmons said the foundation also will manage the money, and potential donors want to know that the money will be managed appropriately.

The total price tag for the park is $75 million, including a little more than $24 million for infrastructure. The first phase is to build the infrastructure. In addition to the $10 million in city money, the city is seeking to receive $13 million in federal transportation money. The city should know if it receives the money in September, Emmons said.

Councilman Richard Moloney questioned what the city will do if the federal government doesn’t approve the $13 million.

Emmons said if the city doesn’t get the federal money this year, it will apply again next year. Emmons said if it doesn’t receive the federal money in the next two years, officials are developing an alternative plan.

“We are not going to spend any of the $10 million, unless the council approves it,” Emmons said.

Private fundraising will pay for building the pocket parks along the 2.5-mile stretch. City officials have said they think that once the infrastructure is built, it will be easier to raise money from private sources.

Plans for Town Branch Commons were unveiled in 2013 but were put on hold while the city pursued a major overhaul of Rupp Arena and the attached convention center. When the city and the University of Kentucky could not come to an agreement on the extent of the renovations to Rupp Arena, Gray suspended the Rupp Arena overhaul plans.

With the Rupp project stalled, the city is turning its focus to Town Branch Commons.

About $8 million would be needed to operate the system for 10 years after it is completed. That also will be raised through private donors.

An additional $12 million will be needed for an operating endowment, which would generate $500,000 to $1 million a year for operating expenses beyond the first 10 years. It would be maintained by a nonprofit. Many of the country’s newest parks are maintained by private nonprofits.

The design from Scape/Landscape Architecture of New York calls for a large Central Park-like park on the Cox Street lot west of Rupp Arena, a linear park in the Vine Street parking lot behind city hall, and other improvements to existing parks along the trail, including Triangle and Thoroughbred parks.

The Urban County Council Tuesday heard a well-thought-out and ambitious plan for a public-private partnership to develop and maintain the Town Branch Commons through downtown Lexington, linking the Legacy and Town Branch Trails in a 22-mile trail system.

With this plan, Lexington has the opportunity to create a transformative greenbelt through the heart of our city. We must not blow the opportunity.

On one level there were few surprises. The proposal reflects the vision of SCAPE, the landscape architecture firm that won the 2013 design competition for a linear park along Town Branch, the long-submerged creek that was the backbone of early Lexington.

This illustration shows Town Branch Commons stretching west of Rupp Arena. The downtown linear park would link to two trails, expanding chances for bicycle commuting and recreation.

The surprise, or at least what gave pause, was the $75 million price tag.

That would be a hard bill to swallow, if local taxpayers were asked to pay it all.

But the city is only on the hook for $10 million under the business plan presented Tuesday. And, that only if Lexington wins a federal grant for about $13 million.

Those combined, along with about $1 million of work LexTran would fund at the Transit Center on Vine Street, will be used for the first phase: a 2.5 mile walking and cycling trail from the Isaac Murphy Memorial Art Garden at Third and Midland, where Town Branch originates, along Midland to Vine to the parking lot behind Rupp Arena.

Following the lead of many other cities, including New York and Louisville, a non-profit would take over raising the money to build and maintain parks along that trail, a total of $50 million.

The price of building the parks is put at $30 million. The additional $20 million in private funds includes $8 million for the first decade of maintenance and operating expenses, and a $12 million endowment to provide operating funds into the future.

There are at least two really great things about this business plan.

The first is it plans for the ongoing investment parks require, without relying on the vagaries of annual city budgets. So, if built, people will want to come to the Town Branch Commons because it is consistently safe, clean and well-cared for.

The second is that if the private money doesn’t materialize, the city’s $10 million will be well spent, providing a safe, accessible link for walkers and cyclers among several existing sites: the Isaac Murphy garden, Charles Young Center, Thoroughbred Park, Phoenix Park and Triangle Park.

It will also allow people who live and work outside the city’s core a safe path into and through downtown, by linking the Legacy Trail, which runs from the Kentucky Horse Park, along Newtown Pike, past the new Bluegrass Community and Technical College campus to the Isaac Murphy garden; and the Town Branch Trail, from Masterson Station through the Distillery District to just behind Rupp Arena.

We believe, though, that if the city commits to this initial investment, private interests will be willing to invest heavily in making the compelling vision of a walkable greenbelt through our downtown a reality.