A new, seven-acre high wire and zip line adventure course in Kansas City is set to open April 8 in Swope Park near the Camp Lake of the Woods site.
Some in the city have questioned why Kansas City would allow a private enterprise to operate on public park land.
Forrest Decker with KC’s Parks & Recreations department says the answer is two-fold.
“One, it’s an opportunity for Parks and Recreation to make some additional revenue. We have a revenue sharing arrangement with them,” said Decker.
In the contract obtained by 41 Action News between Go Ape and the city of Kansas City, Missouri, an initial 4 percent of gross revenue will go to the Parks & Rec department.
If revenue surpasses $800,000 annually, the percent returned to the city will jump 1 percent/$100,000 up to 7 percent. It will go back down to 6 percent if gross revenue from the adventure park reaches $1.2 million.
A new experience for KC
Decker says the revenue comes second place to another reason for having Go Ape in Swope Park.
“The biggest reason is it provides an amenity and an experience to users of parks and recreation to the residents of Kansas City and all the region around here that we can’t provide. We currently just do not provide anything like this at all,” said Decker.
Are the trees in the park preserved?
Parks & Rec said forestry officials looked through Go Ape’s design and then walked throughout the construction site to identify each tree that would be removed and determine if any needed to stay.
“The only trees that are going to be removed were older, decaying trees or undesirable species. There’s a lot of invasive honey suckle,” said Decker.
So what is this treetops adventure course?
Following a 30-minute training session when you start, it will take another 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 hours to complete the five-site course.
“That means you’ll climb a rope ladder, do some different high ropes crossings and zip line back down to the forest floor five times, so those are our five sections,” said Go Ape Swope Park site manager Hannah Bowen.
Bowen says you don’t need to be in tip-top shape to participate.
“The hardest thing out here on the course is climbing on the ladder to get up there,” said Bowen. “Once you’re up there, it’s easy. You can slide on through. You’re on a trolley, so it can just slide on across any crossing you want.”
What if I can’t afford it?
Going through the course will set you back $58 if you are an adult or $38 for a child 10 to 15 years old (no children under 10 years old are allowed to participate). However, the contract agreement with the city calls for at least 3 free days per season per year.
“Some people just can’t really afford to come out and do this for a day or can’t afford their whole family to come and do it, so we want to make sure that there is an opportunity for everyone to be able to enjoy this at some level,” said Decker.
-----
Brian Abel can be reached at brian.abel@kshb.com.
