New details emerge in Olmsted Parks Conservancy's plan for 'Beargrass Preserve' near Cherokee Park

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – Olmsted Parks officials unveiled the latest concept Thursday for 24 acres rising above Cherokee Park.

The “Beargrass Preserve” is planned on land once owned by the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary on Alta Vista and eyed for residential development. The Olmsted conservancy would manage the preserve.

New renderings in a working master plan show the current vision. It includes boardwalk, paved and soft-surface trails; an open lawn; wetlands; a rain garden; and new offices for the conservancy, along with a library and patio for events.

“We’re getting closer to what this space is going to look like based on public input,” said Jesse Hendrix-Inman, an Olmsted Parks spokeswoman.

Olmsted supporters got a first look at the layout under consideration during a breakfast at the Mellwood Art Center Thursday morning. The conservancy expects to finalize the master plan and know more about the project’s budget, private fundraising campaign and timeline by the end of the year, Hendrix-Inman said.

She called the building the most “striking part” of the plan. Besides new offices for the conservancy, which now is headquartered at Joe Creason Park, it would include a research library and archive.

“We want it to be a place where people can start their exploration of the Olmsted parks system, where we can kind of help them guide their experience as they explore all 17 Olmsted parks,” she said.

The site has four distinct landscape areas, from forested slopes and limestone cliffs along Beargrass Creek to an upland forest and meadowlike terrain above. Those zones guided different suggested uses.

In 2019, the seminary went public with a plan to sell the acreage for $13.4 million, an offering that could have cleared the way for 78 single-family residential lots, according to a property listing at that time.

But Norman and Belita Noltemeyer, who live nearby, announced an $8 million donation to the Olmsted Parks Conservancy in December 2021, paving the way for a conservancy-affiliated company to then buy the land.

Since last May, parks leaders and planners have held public workshops and meetings involving 240 people, according to a PowerPoint presentation.