Master Plan

2026 Master Plan  

Shawnee County Parks + Recreation is currently in the process of creating a robust and statistically valid Master Plan.

CLICK HERE TO PROVIDE FEEDBACK:  MASTER PLAN SURVEY

What is a Plan?

A Parks and Recreation Master Plan serves as a long-range vision and strategic roadmap for a community’s public spaces, trails, and facilities. It is a comprehensive document that analyzes existing assets, identifies gaps in service, and establishes a clear set of priorities for the next 10 to 20 years.More than just a checklist of repairs, the plan acts as a blueprint for growth and investment, ensuring that land acquisition and recreational programming keep pace with population changes. By blending technical data with direct community feedback, the Master Plan ensures that every dollar spent aligns with the residents’ needs for health, wellness, and environmental stewardship, ultimately creating a vibrant and sustainable park system for future generations.

Why Do We Plan?

We plan to ensure that the future of Shawnee County Parks + Recreation isn't left to chance. As our community grows and evolves, our recreational needs change with it. Systematic planning allows us to move beyond reactive maintenance and toward proactive growth. By creating a Master Plan, we can identify underserved areas, protect our natural resources, and ensure that every tax dollar is invested in projects that provide the highest value to our residents. Ultimately, we plan to build a legacy. This process allows us to align our budget with community values, ensuring that our parks and trails remain safe, accessible, and vibrant spaces for health and connection for decades to come.


2014 Master Plan

When the vote was approved to consolidate Parks and Recreation of Topeka with Shawnee County Parks and Recreation in 2011, a vision for how best to serve the recreational needs of Shawnee County residents was formed. Given the short time from approval to implementation, what the vision lacked was a step-by-step plan to delineate the best way to efficiently and effectively make vision become reality when the consolidation actually occurred. Since then we’ve had our growing pains and continued to adapt to and identify with how the newly-expanded department meets the needs of the community. One of the first things initiated as the consolidation occurred was the development of a master plan, which, after two years of research and examination of every aspect of the department’s facilities, functions, programs and the needs they meet or not, has finally come to fruition.

Documents