Berkley Schools, Oak Park kick off construction at Tyler Park

BERKLEY — Construction of updates to Tyler Park have begun and will continue through the fall.

Construction at the park, located at 14000 Oak Park Blvd., started at the end of February as a joint project between the Berkley School District and city of Oak Park.

The district stated in a social media post that the construction plans for the park include a new varsity softball field with a fence, dugouts, bullpens, stadium seating and lights; a new softball/baseball practice field; a new restroom facility; a walking path around the entire park; a large multipurpose field; and improved drainage.

Construction is expected to run through late fall and, as the park will be fenced off, people will not be able to use the facilities until spring 2027 at the earliest. It also was noted that the teams that use the park’s fields will be relocated for a year.

The school district’s director of communications, Jessica Stilger, said this construction is being done in conjunction with the district’s bond and sinking fund work. Stilger highlighted Tyler Park’s issues with drainage as a need for improvement.

“Tyler Park is often very waterlogged and it has not been a great field for our students because of how much water is on the field,” she said. “That started the conversation of, ‘If we work on the water retention issue, what else could this space become?’ And right now, we do not own any other softball fields except for what is on Tyler Park, and we wanted an opportunity to renovate and create really nice fields for our softball teams.”

The park is owned by both Berkley Schools and Oak Park. The land the park is located on is near the Berkley Building Blocks Early Childhood Center, the district’s administration office and Norup International School.

Oak Park Deputy City Manager of Community Services Adam Owczarzak said the city wasn’t planning on tackling the Tyler Park updates soon, but it felt there was a cost savings in this project when Berkley stated its intent. The hard construction cost for the city, he stated, is approximately $400,000. Combined with Berkley’s portion of $3,033,879, the total cost for the project is more than $3.4 million.

Along with the land grading improvements, which will address the drainage issues, Owczarzak said there will be additions to the walking path.

“The walking path, I wouldn’t say it’s going to be raised, but it’s going to be a little bit above grade from the rest of the field,” he said. “There’s going to be minimal flooding on the walking path itself, like it’s going to be raised up a little bit. So that’s kind of a cool feature that we’re incorporating in the design.”

“Technically, it’s one walking path, but since essentially the field is split half and half, we’re paying for our portion of it and (Berkley is) paying for their portion of it,” Owczarzak continued. “On the Oak Park specific side that we own, it’s definitely not as much as what they’re doing on the south end of the property, but there is a phase two where there’s going to be a pavilion, a playscape, and potentially some other features that could go in there, but that’s kind of at a later date when funding allows for that.”

Stilger added that the school district and city have been working together to create the plans for the recreational and athletic uses of Tyler Park.

“The multipurpose field will land on the Oak Park property. The walking path is around the entire property. A walking path will be built on both sides of the property, and then the restroom, varsity field and practice field will be contained on the Berkley School side of the property,” she said.