Officials in Oakland County and Pontiac are celebrating the completion of a $3 million renovation of Pontiac Oaks Park, turning a once-neglected city park into a cleaner, more welcoming place for families to enjoy. 

The park, previously called Hawthorne Park, had problems with illegal trash dumping and run down facilities. Oakland County Parks Planning Supervisor Simon Rivers explains that the county worked closely with local residents to find out what improvements the community really wanted. 

“There was a lot of trash and illegal dumping,” Rivers said. “The fishing pier was in bad shape, and the playground was falling apart in several spots.” 

The county partnered with the city to restore the area. Pontiac will keep ownership of the park, while the county takes over maintenance and construction of new facilities. 

Rivers mentions that upgrades include fixing up the popular fishing pier, renovating the bathrooms, adding new playground equipment, and expanding the disc golf course. 

“We’re making improvements that the community actually wants to see, instead of trying to do things we think are best,” Rivers said. 

Pontiac Oaks is one of several parks being renewed across the county. 

Rivers also says there are plans to improve parks in Southfield, Madison Heights, and Waterford.

This story is a part of WDET’s ongoing series, the Detroit Tree Canopy Project.

Oakland County Parks and Bloomfield Hills Schools are working together to turn natural areas into public parks.

Officials say that this partnership is designed to protect the sites for the long term, give more residents easier access and keep school programs going.

Oakland County Parks Director Chris Ward and Bloomfield Hills Schools Superintendent Rick West say the plan will make the land more open to the community while preserving a special natural area in a suburban neighborhood.

Since Bloomfield Hills doesn’t have any public parks, this change is a big deal for local residents. Sites like the Johnson Nature Center may eventually connect to walking paths, including a safe route through the city. 

Students already use these sites for their lessons. A fifth-grade class took a field trip to the Johnson Nature Center recently to learn about the local watershed.

West says the center is a valuable natural area in the midst of the highly developed community. “It’s… nature at its best, right here, nestled in Bloomfield Township, and our students get to benefit from it. Our community gets to benefit from it, and that’s the richness of the partnership [with Oakland County Parks],” he says.

This agreement is a teamwork effort between the school district and the parks department, aimed at benefiting both recreation and education for students, local residents, and the entire county.

This story is a part of WDET’s ongoing series, the Detroit Tree Canopy Project.

NASA’s Artemis II mission has captured the imaginations of a new generation of space enthusiasts, young and old.

Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen are  due to splash down in the Pacific Ocean around 8 p.m. EST Friday, April 10 near San Diego. 

When they do, they will step foot on Earth with an extraordinary credential: they’ve been further from Earth than any humans in history, traveling over 250,000 miles and back again.

The 4-person crew will have spent a little over one week in space, with a lunar fly by that produced captivating images of the moon, including a solar eclipse and an earth rise.

The crew was in radio communication with mission control when they broke the record. Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, alongside his crew members, took the opportunity to name two craters on the moon’s surfaces that had not been named yet. The first, they called Integrity, the name they had given their shuttle. The second name was deeply personal. The crater “Carroll” was dedicated to the late wife of the mission commander, Reid Wiseman.

In 2028, NASA plans to execute the first crewed lunar landing since Apollo 17, with the goal of establishing a lunar base on the moon.

Ed Cackett is a professor of astronomy at Wayne State University and the Michigan Science Center’s astronomer in residence. He joined The Metro to discuss the gravity of the moment, and the benefits of space exploration.

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