But Bakers Creek Park just got bigger, and many more public green spaces may sprout up around Kannapolis on land the city has bought or is eyeing.

Last week, city workers finished installing two sets of horseshoe pits in a two-acre addition to Bakers Creek Park. The addition includes a playground, two volleyball courts, bathrooms and a sidewalk to the park’s greenway. The project’s $59,500 price tag was split between the state, Rowan County, Cabarrus County and Kannapolis governments.

Bakers Creek Park includes 37 acres of fields and forest along West A Street. Rowan County founded the park in 1985, and the city of Kannapolis took it over in January.

Assistant City Manager Greg McGinnis said Kannapolis is only beginning to catch up with what other cities have.

For decades, the same family that founded the mill town in 1906 pumped millions of dollars into a YMCA that became one of the organization’s best in the country. It was the city’s primary source of recreation, offering a theater, a bowling alley, a library, a pool and a lot more.

When Cannon Mills was sold and Kannapolis became an incorporated city in 1984, all that changed. The YMCA building by Plant 1 was torn down to make way for parking and a new one was built on West C Street.

Cannon Memorial YMCA remains 4,000 members strong today. It’s one of only three in the country with a freestanding senior center, CEORoland Davey said.

But until this year, Kannapolis residents have had no park to call their own.

Last month, the Vision Cabinet placed a system of parks high on its list of priorities. The city council appointed that group of about 40 residents more than a year ago to drum up short-term and long-term goals to improve quality of life in Kannapolis.

“We know that we’re way behind,” McGinnis said. “When you’ve been unincorporated for so many years and take in so much, it takes time to change things.

“I don’t know who sets the standards, but we know from out of this visioning process that there are some things people want to see.”

McGinnis says the city government is now considering several other park projects. Here’s a rundown:

• In January, the city bought land from Atlantic American Properties for $1.5 million. Sprinkled around Loop Road and Main Street, the land includes 61 acres on 13 parcels. Those properties include the 11.6-acre Midway ballfields, eight acres behind the police station, 23 acres near the YMCA and a nine-acre strip between the train tracks and Ridge Street that extends all the way from Jackson Park Road to Centergrove Road. Many of those properties could become green spaces, McGinnis said.
• The city is building new public works offices on Bethpage Road to replace its offices on Richard Avenue. It has applied for state money to add soccer fields, restrooms and trails on the same property.
• The city plans to add two small, neighborhood parks: one along Rosemont Avenue and one by Wilson Street.
• Long-range plans may include additional fields and facilities at Fieldcrest Cannon Stadium or in the newly annexed Coddle Creek area, where the city expects to build a fifth fire station in the next few years.
• For $2.8 million, Cabarrus County has begun building the first phase of a 90-acre park along Orphanage Road. That park is in Coddle Creek, and will include outdoor basketball and tennis courts and softball and soccer fields.

Loran Shulte, Kannapolis’ director of parks and recreation, has nine part-time employees who work with him at Bakers Creek Park. He said that park’s new addition will help during weekends in the spring and early summer, when people crowd the volleyball courts and softball fields and joggers and picnickers cover the grass.

But he said the city will continue to see more demand for soccer fields and must begin to meet recreational needs in other parts of the city.

“We’re dealing with a lot of people who never before had the chance for self government,” Shulte said.