CINCINNATI — For the last year, Great Parks of Hamilton County have been gathering community input on what should be done with the 22-acre former Gamble estate in Westwood.
That quest for input continues, at least until Sept. 11, but Great Parks has released its first draft of plans for the future landscape of the park.
"We want to hear from the community," said Amy Roell, director of programming for Great Parks of Hamilton County. "What do they want us to prioritize? Is it accessible walking paths? Is it preservation of the buildings? Is it education? What are the main things that are most important to them, so that when we get this plan finalized and attach a budget to it and a construction schedule, we have a good, solid game plan of what we're going to do."
The park on Werk Road is currently open, but the space doesn't look much different now than when it was acquired by Great Parks. While it's open from dawn to dusk for the surrounding community, the only access to the space currently are mowed paths only accessible to pedestrians and their four-footed friends.
After a year of gathering information from the surrounding community, the first draft plan for the park's development shows a multitude of options contained within the former Gamble estate.
"If you look at Great Parks, they kind of ring 275 so any time we are able to get into the city or get into bigger neighborhoods, where we don't have a big presence at that particular moment in time is a big deal for us, we're very excited about it," said Roell.
The plan, released on Sept. 2, currently features pedestrian walkways and boardwalks alongside trail networks designed for accessibility. Some play areas, including an accessible treehouse, are also featured in the plan's design.
Great Parks' plan doesn't say what it plans to do with existing buildings on the property, but the plan does highlight a new deck on the barn, a carriage house and a caretaker's house situated near a planned greenhouse and community garden beds — if the community wants them.
The bulk of the property appears to be intended for forest, wooded wetland and riparian restoration — along with plenty of trailside opportunities to admire those restored spaces.
Roell said in the springtime, wildflowers can already be found growing on the property in abundance.
The plan also includes two entrances for vehicles that lead to a small parking area with a school bus parking zone, though three other entrances to the space along the borders of the property are planned to be pedestrian-only.
Community input will continue to shape Great Parks' current drafted plan, but as it stands the goal of the space off of Werk Road will remain green space, Roell said.
"Not only for people to enjoy, but also for wildlife," said Roell. "One of the things that neighbors tell us is that the amount of wildlife they see here is amazing — deer, fox, coyote, all kinds of birds. So, this is a great wildlife spot and we definitely want to preserve that as much as possible."
She added that even the planned spaces that will require a little more constructing — like a small amphitheater and play areas planned for children — will be designed with as many natural materials as possible, to ensure they blend in, while also sparking plenty of imagination.
Great Parks of Hamilton County acquired the former Gamble estate property in August 2021 and announced its intentions to craft the space into a green oasis in the heart of Cincinnati's largest neighborhood.
But before that, the fate of the property was uncertain as Greenacres Foundation, the property's previous owner, debated whether to sell the property or develop it into a subdivision. In 2020, the Greenacres Foundation put out a request for proposals to local home builders in the Greater Cincinnati area, but those plans never culminated in anything substantial before the property was acquired by Great Parks the following year.
Long before all of that, however, the former Gamble property has carried years of history within its boundaries. The once-working farm was where James Norris Gamble, the son of one of Proctor & Gamble's founders, lived from 1871 until his death in 1932.
In the kitchen of the house that once sat on the property at 2918 Werk Road, Gamble invented Ivory Soap.
Gamble’s grandson, former Cincinnati Reds owner Louis Nippert, inherited the property in 1961. His wife, Louise Nippert, transferred it to Greenacres Foundation in 2009. One year later, the foundation sought a demolition permit for the 170-year-old house as part of a plan to convert the Gamble estate to a nature preserve where 2,000 school children a year could learn about agriculture, plant and animal life.
When Westwood activists balked at the demolition, Cincinnati City Council intervened by declaring the building historic, although the demolition permit was eventually granted and the building was torn down in 2013.
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