{"id":220587,"date":"2016-02-10T06:06:15","date_gmt":"2016-02-09T20:06:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=220587"},"modified":"2016-02-10T06:06:15","modified_gmt":"2016-02-09T20:06:15","slug":"90-pct-of-amp-open-for-daytime-use","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/90-pct-of-amp-open-for-daytime-use\/","title":{"rendered":"90 pct of AMP open for daytime use"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Ninety<\/a>
Ninety percent of the American Memorial Park is open to the public but for daytime use only. Lights for the walkway and parking area have to be fixed before the park can be opened at night. (Frauleine Villanueva-Dizon)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ninety percent of the American Memorial Park is now accessible to the public but only for daytime use.<\/p>\n

Half a year after Typhoon Soudelor struck Saipan there is still work to be done at the park.<\/p>\n

According to park superintendent Jim Richardson, they have yet to receive all the supplies they ordered to replace the walkway and parking area lights that were damaged.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll of our sidewalk lighting and parking area lights were also destroyed by the typhoon,\u201d Richardson said. <\/p>\n

\u201cAs we open the park, it\u2019s open only for day use until we get the rest of the lights installed,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

No timeline was given as to when the park will be open for nighttime use, but Richardson said they will install the lights immediately once all of them arrives.<\/p>\n

\u201cI keep hoping that the lights will arrive next week and we can go about taking the next couple of weeks to installing the lights,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n

He added that even some small areas in the park will not be open for many months due to safety reasons.<\/p>\n

Richardson reminded the pubic to adhere to warning signs on certain areas in the park where people are not yet allowed to use.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d like for people to stay out of the areas that are closed because it\u2019s completely about safety,\u201d Richardson said. <\/p>\n

The walkways from the beach as well as the pavilion have already been cleared up, the Visitor\u2019s Center was opened last October, although the auditorium remains closed until the park can get contractors to take care of the damage. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe just got bids. We\u2019re frustrated that it has taken us months to get bids,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n

Tennis court<\/strong><\/p>\n

The next priority for the park is the tennis court which has been closed for six months now.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re hoping that we can get the tennis court open for day use sometime in March,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n

The court has already been cleared of trees and fencing and lighting materials are already ordered and shipped. <\/p>\n

He added that they will also be touching up the playing surface of the court. <\/p>\n

\u201cI would expect that installed during this month,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce we receive the lights, we probably have to close them again for a short time period so we can install those lights,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Aside from about $100,000 that the park used for restoration last fiscal year, they have about $482,000 on top of their regular park money this fiscal year from the National Parks Service to use for park restoration.<\/p>\n

Richardson said the challenge for the restoration was the shipment of the materials that they need as well as the many trees that were downed by Soudelor. <\/p>\n

Tree replacements<\/strong><\/p>\n

The park estimates that 90 percent of their trees were \u201ceither uprooted, broken, or damaged to the point that they may not survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of the trees planted 20 to 30 years ago, turned out not to be so durable,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n

He added that the replacements of the trees will need additional money in the future and that they will seek the public\u2019s help on what kind of trees to plant.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are planning to replace the trees in the formal landscape which is the memorial area. Once we get our auditorium fixed, so that it\u2019s healthy enough for people to meet there, we\u2019re going to have a meeting and invite the public to help us plan how to put trees back in that formal landscape,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n

Most of the work done to restore the park was made by the local park employees themselves, rendering extra hours and most of their days, according to Richardson.<\/p>\n

\u201cI give a ton of credit for the local park staff for working so hard and get the park open for the public,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n

They were also able to get help from Hawaii and California parks for some weeks and the CNMI government for some equipment.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to thank the public for their patience and understanding. We understand how much people appreciate and love the park,\u201d Richardson said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ninety percent of the American Memorial Park is now accessible to the public but only…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":220588,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[268,602,9631,67],"class_list":["post-220587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","tag-american-memorial-park","tag-amp","tag-national-parks-service","tag-people"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}