By Nathanael
Shelton
News Staff Writer
Parts of
Raiford Street will soon be receiving a
makeover thanks to a $75,000 grant the
town of Selma received at the beginning
of this year.The renovations are to take
place on the area of Raiford Street
between Anderson Street and Waddell
Street.“We are hoping the aesthetic
improvements will draw additional
traffic to the town and more customers
to merchants,” said Richard Douglas,
town manager. The renovations will
include new landscaping in eight of the
plant beds along Raiford Street and
replacing all the streetlights between
Railroad and Waddell Streets. The
existing lights will be repurposed for
use at the Harrison Gym on Noble Street.
The grant will also be used to purchase
12 new cast iron street benches. The
cost of the new benches is $13,000, and
they will replace the deteriorating
wooden existing street benches,
Douglas said.
Also the light poles at the
intersections of Raiford and Anderson
Streets and Raiford and Waddell Streets
will be painted, along with the flagpole
in front of town hall and the 18 trash
receptacles located down Raiford Street,
he said. New dome tops for the trash
receptacles have also been purchased.The
landscaping will be done by members of
the arboretum at Johnston Community
College and senior class members of JCC
from the landscape and garden program,
said Lin Frye, arboretum director at
JCC.The students came up with a theme
for the landscape renovations, “Hometown
Charm from Tradition to Contemporary,”
Frye said. “All the renovations are
designed based on that theme,” Frye
said. According to Frye, the students
did a lot of research to develop their
designs. “They talked with the town and
interviewed shop owners to see what the
people of Selma wanted,” Frye said. All
of the plants are low maintenance,
drought resistant, and chosen because
they will not obscure the view of
pedestrians and motorists, she said. The
flowers that the students are planting
will be pink, yellow and blue in the
spring and blue and yellow in the fall.
However, for the 4th of July the flowers
will bloom red, white and blue. “I am
darn proud of them,” Frye said. “They’ve
done a heck of a good job from inception
to finished product.”
“I am very impressed with their effort,”
Douglas said. “Their designs are
traditional yet progressive.” “The
renovations should be complete by the
end of June,” he said. “We want to have
everything ready to go for the 4th of
July.” All the materials have been
ordered and the landscape designs have
been approved, Douglas said. The grant
almost covered all the costs of the
renovations. A small portion of the cost
had to be absorbed through the existing
town budget, he said.
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Vick Park taking shape in Uptown 05/27/2010
Things
are getting ready to “set”-up in
Vick Park (pocket park) in Selma.
According to Dina Flowers, chairman
of the Selma Appearance Committee,
the grounds are ready to have the
concrete floor poured. Flowers said
that her and the rest of the SAC
have been working hard to clean the
area. “It was a mess,” Flowers said.
According to Flowers, the SAC plans
to contribute a large portion of the
labor effort, and the park should be
completed within a year. A $28,000
proposal to create a park in the
“pocket” across from Selma Town Hall
and adjacent to the Visitor’s Center
was unanimously adopted by the Selma
Town Council in early March. The
proposal was created by the SAC,
which consists of Flowers, Mary
Fuller, vice chairman, Eric Jackson,
Laura Thomas, Suzanne Parker, Linda
Hinnant, Brenda Pickett, Graham
Pickett, Louise White, Jane
Williamson, Gene Lusk, Jane
Peterson, Mark Peterson, and
Mavorine Willoughby. According to
the proposal, it is the SAC’s hope
that the park will “become a
well-utilized asset and a lasting
memorial to individuals who have
made a remarkable impression on the
town’s identity.” The proposal is
divided into four components;
Naming, fixtures, perimeter and
landscaping. The naming component of
the proposal involves naming the
park “Vick Park,” after both Dr.
Joshua Vick and his son Dr. George
Vick, who are commonly associated
with Vick’s Vapo-rub. An $800 bronze
plaque will be displayed at the park
in honor of their family’s
contributions to the town of Selma.
The fixture component of the
proposal involves removing the
existing masonry planters and
repurposing them for use at the
Selma train station. It also
involves the creation of a 12’x16’
arbor, the installing of eight cast
iron benches, three new light
fixtures, and two thermo-plastic
coated metal picnic tables. The
total cost for this component of the
proposal is $13,600. The perimeter
component of the proposal involves
improvements on the three boundary
walls and the park floor. The
proposal recommended that the gravel
flooring be replaced with concrete
and that a mural depicting Vick’s
Vapo-rub logo be painted on it. The
proposal’s suggestion for the
boundary walls was to plaster, prime
and paint all three walls in a
manner that complements the overall
design of the park. It was also the
proposal’s suggestion that perimeter
fencing be installed in areas of the
park where it will accent the park’s
design, and also add to the overall
security of the park. The total cost
for this component of the proposal
is $11,160. The landscaping
component of the proposal involves
placing various local species of
plants in key locations within the
park. It was also the proposal’s
suggestion that the existing plants
be reused. This includes the two
Japanese maples, the two hollies,
and the weeping cherry tree. The
total cost of this component of the
proposal is $2,575, and the total
cost for the complete endeavor is
$28,135.
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