Dog owners, homeowners bicker over lovely West Matheson Park. Will new plan make peace?
West Matheson Hammock Park is getting a long-promised makeover but the project has angered its most frequent users, who say it’s meant to accommodate the wealthy homeowners who surround Miami’s oldest and wildest park.
A restoration plan for the 108-acre green gem released Wednesday by the Miami-Dade County parks department pledges improved access for all. Yet dog lovers who visit the park daily argue it will do the opposite.
A 10-year dispute over entry to the park between dog owners and homeowners in the abutting neighborhood has boiled over again even as the county seeks to put an end to their complaints about how the park is managed while preserving the Protected Natural Area for the public.
According to the key element of the plan, a paved parking lot at the Old Cutler Road trailhead and a new boardwalk along the rocky, puddle-pocked, 500-yard pathway through the tropical hardwood hammock would become the inviting main entrance to the park and the only one for people who arrive in vehicles. The popular and convenient north entrance gate, accessible by car on School House Road through the Hammock Lakes neighborhood, would be permanently closed to all but pedestrians, cyclists or county vehicles.
Dog owners and park users who have grown accustomed to driving in through the north gate, which was a locked maintenance gate until 2009, are opposed. They say the county is succumbing to pressure by Hammock Lakes Homeowners Association members who want to restrict outsider traffic in their affluent neighborhood.
“The homeowners want to privatize a public road and reduce the number of visitors to a public park, and the county is bowing to the privileged rather than accommodating the people,” said Douglas Fernandez, who has been bringing his Labrador retrievers to the park for years. “It makes no sense to close. The north entrance is more practical than the Cutler Road entrance and a long, wet, intimidating trail that people don’t, can’t or won’t use. They’re going to kill attendance at the park.”
Fernandez led a rally at West Matheson on Saturday, attended by about 100 people protesting closure of the north gate, where Coral Gables police were posted. Instead of driving through the gate and parking inside the park, they had to park on homeowners’ swales.
“This closure has backfired on the homeowners,” Fernandez said. “We don’t want to park on their grass and they don’t want us parking on their grass.”
Homeowners association president Bill Ogden, who attended Saturday’s rally and talked to Fernandez, objects to the number of cars passing through Hammock Lakes on their way in and out of the park, not to visitors, whether they be human or canine.The association paid to have a gatehouse installed at Kendall Drive and School House Road in 2014. Park users say it’s a deterrent to access and that Ogden exaggerates the volume of cars entering the park, which is rarely more than two dozen per day and a fraction of the number of construction and landscaping trucks going in and out of the neighborhood.
Ogden said he and his frustrated neighbors have been waiting for the county to implement a West Matheson improvement plan for 15 years. During that time the park was neglected and co-opted by what he calls “the dog interests.” By county law, dogs are supposed to be on a leash but the open expanse of West Matheson became known as an unofficial, unfenced dog haven.
“I understand why they like it and it’s not our intention to strictly enforce the leash law,” he said. “But the park has been taken hostage by the dog interests.’’
He said the north gate was never supposed to be open for cars.
“It breaks my heart to see cars driving in that habitat, parking on one of Miami’s most spectacular pieces of land,” he said. “Once they fix the Cutler Road trail and people realize it’s a beautiful walk, it will take pressure off improper usage of the north gate.”
It takes at least six minutes to walk the trail off Old Cutler Road, which some people find unsafe because the woods surrounding it used to have a reputation as a hiding spot for drug users or sexual encounters. Since the park reopened, an attendant has been posted to provide security, with a golf cart ready to transport those who need assistance.
The Americans With Disabilities Act-compliant boardwalk will cost $2.2 million. Redoing the gravel parking lot with permeable pavers will cost $660,000, according to county estimates.
“It’s going to be difficult for disabled people with dogs to use that lot and make that trek even when it’s a boardwalk, so the north entrance should remain open for disabled use,” said Julie Paikowsky, who has three dogs. “Why mess with the north entrance at all? Leave well enough alone or be transparent and explain why this is happening. It’s sad. It’s fishy. It’s elitist.”
The plan includes construction of a fenced dog run similar to the one at Chapman Field Park, three miles south of Matheson, which is 3.6 acres, largest in the county.
“The park will remain a dog-friendly park, meaning residents can walk their dogs on a leash and dogs will be able to be off leash within the dog run area, which will be one of the largest in the park system,” the plan states.
Dogs will miss their freedom, but County Commissioner Xavier Suarez, who pushed to keep the north gate open to disabled drivers, said he’ll advocate for the enclosure to be as roomy as possible.
“I’ve been listening to both sides for five years and there’s no easy solution that makes everybody happy,” he said.
A letter sent to commissioners Friday by Miami lawyer David Winker on behalf of park users requests a meeting on the plan because there was no public notice about the sudden closure of the gate or commencement of the improvement project, which “is the quintessential solution to a problem that does not exist” and an expenditure of tax money for a project “the community does not want” based on a decision “made behind closed doors with undue influence by the Hammock Lakes Homeowners Association,” Winker said. He also argues that “reasonable public access” to parks as ordained by county code cannot be denied.
Other elements feature revival of the park’s Coral Rock Nursery, which was a greenhouse for Fairchild Tropical Botanical Garden, with eco-classes for kids and adults; development of jogging and cycling paths, and restoration of nature trails.
In 1930, William J. Matheson and son Hugh donated the tract to the county for its first public park. One of the last remaining pristine hardwood hammocks in South Florida, it is home to birds, wildlife and seven endangered plants, said Jenny Stern, natural areas manager for the parks department.
“This is county park No. 1 and our priority is to maintain its integrity for all residents,” said Joe Cornely, assistant director for planning, design and construction excellence. “The north gate was always a service entrance and its use as a public vehicular entrance has been a short blip in the history of West Matheson. We don’t want cars traveling in that sensitive area any longer.”
The entire park will be closed during boardwalk construction from October to May, for safety reasons, the county said -- another blow for park users who say it’s ideal for social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic.
Fernandez, planning more rallies, said the park will become more hidden than it already is.
“They’re going to turn a treasured public park into a no-man’s land, and the neighbors will finally have their big, private, empty backyard,” he said.
This story was originally published August 28, 2020 at 6:00 AM.
