The two big game fields planned for Wilson Creek Park will be artificial turf instead of natural grass, after a groundwater permit came back at less than a third of the water the city asked for.
Celina's City Council is set on Tuesday, Oct. 13, to approve a $143,000 contract amendment with Dunaway Associates to redraw the first phase of the park around synthetic fields. The item is on the consent agenda for the 5 p.m. meeting in the council chambers at 112 N. Colorado St.
A smaller water permit
Wilson Creek Park covers about 100 acres, and its first phase takes up 30 of them, according to a memo from Parks and Recreation Director Steve Walsh. Construction on that phase began in late summer 2025. It includes two large multi-use fields with game lighting, two cricket pitches, concrete and soft-surface trails, restrooms, roads and parking.
The plan relied on an amenity pond filled with well water as the park's main source of irrigation. The city asked the North Texas Groundwater Conservation District, in permit requests filed in 2025 and 2026, for roughly 32 million gallons a year, the memo says. The district's board approved 9.1 million.
Staff first trimmed the landscaping. Gravel and other aggregates were added to parking lot islands, more drought-tolerant and native plants were swapped in, traditional Bermuda grass was cut back and native Texas seed mixes were added. Even so, the memo says, calculations showed the permitted water would not be enough to keep the grass game fields and the remaining landscaping irrigated.
The council discussed irrigation at the park in a closed session on Sept. 8 and, according to the memo, directed staff that night to move ahead with a design change that puts synthetic turf on the two game fields.