Drive past 170 Hackberry Hill this month and you'll notice something missing. A long stretch of chain-link fence along the park's edge toward Willow Drive is simply gone. If you've been watching the "Hackberry Park Revitalization" signs go up over the past few years and assumed the fence coming down means dirt is about to move for new ball fields, you'd be forgiven. You'd also be getting ahead of the actual paperwork.
As CitizenPortal.ai reported, the Orono City Council approved a change order last month, not a groundbreaking. The city removed 240 linear feet of 3.5-foot galvanized fencing and is adding a concrete pad with privacy screening sized to hold up to two portable restrooms, including one ADA-compliant unit. Council members also debated whether to add a permanent drinking fountain, weighing vendor quotes of $14,000 to $18,000 against a staff estimate closer to $5,000 for a simpler spigot or bottle filler. That's the entire scope of what just changed at Hackberry Park. The multi-use field and the tee-ball renovation that most residents think of when they hear "revitalization" are still on paper.
What the Budget Actually Says
The confusion is understandable, because the city's own capital plan does show real money attached to Hackberry Park, just not yet spent. The Hackberry Park Masterplan has moved through three funding phases:
| Phase | Year | Budget |
|---|---|---|
| Plan | 2023 | $10,000 |
| Design | 2024 | $50,000 |
| Construct | 2025-2026 | $1,100,000 |
The scope for that construction line is a multi-use field and a renovated tee-ball field at the same location. On paper, that $1.1 million is sitting in the current budget window. In practice, the Park Commission's own November 2025 meeting notes tell a more cautious story: commissioners said they weren't yet comfortable with the design as proposed, citing concerns about grading, tree removal, and traffic speed on Willow Drive. They also noted the process felt backwards, since the plan had already gone to the City Council before it came back to them for feedback, and they asked for the chance to weigh in before any final council action.
That's not a project in crisis. It's a project where the budget line and the on-the-ground consensus haven't caught up to each other yet, which is a distinction worth knowing if you're the one wondering whether to plan around a new field next spring or the spring after.
Where the Pickleball Courts Actually Belong
If you've heard rumors that Hackberry Park is getting pickleball courts, that's a different project entirely, and its own timeline has already slipped. The city's capital plan lists a separate line item for courts at a site adjacent to 340 Willow Drive N, near a spot residents know as the Donation Garden. The funding structure explains a lot about why nothing has broken ground: $35,000 from the Parks Fund, with the remaining $500,000 expected to come from donations. The plan explicitly notes the project is contingent on that outside funding coming together.
The original schedule penciled in construction for 2024 and 2025. Both of those years have now passed with no courts open to the public. The justification memo is clear about demand, noting that the Park Commission has placed a high priority on introducing pickleball somewhere in the Orono park system and that a sizable group of residents has been asking for courts anywhere in the city. What the memo also floats, almost as a footnote, is an alternative: building the courts at the Orono Golf Course instead of the Willow Drive site. Nothing about that alternative has been decided. If you've been checking the Donation Garden site for progress, the honest answer is that the money to build there hasn't shown up yet, and the location itself might change before it does.
The Bigger List Hackberry Is Competing Against
Hackberry Park isn't the only project pulling on the same pool of staff time and capital dollars. The city's current projects list also includes Antoine Park, a new Public Works Facility, a Golf Course Pavilion, and an expansion of the Lurton Park parking lot, alongside routine work like pavement replacement tied to a Metropolitan Council sewer project and ongoing sewer repair along North Shore Drive. None of that is unusual for a city Orono's size, but it does explain why a masterplan that started in 2023 is still working through change orders in 2026. Every dollar and every staff hour at Hackberry is one that isn't going toward the Public Works Facility or the golf course pavilion that same month.
As CitizenPortal.ai reported, the Park Commission's own 2026 work plan, adopted at its February meeting, names exactly three carryover priorities: trails, golf-course planning, and the Hackberry Park revitalization. Commission chair Kim told the group the intent is to run a more structured agenda that ties every update back to a specific council goal, framing the commission's role as advisory rather than decision-making. Commissioner Jacob Janney, who continues to sit on the Hackberry subcommittee, used part of that meeting to flag a different priority entirely, telling the group that an important trail connection to watch is the Loose Line Dakota Trail link, and urging commissioners to track what neighboring cities and the county do before Orono commits to its own piece of that route.
That trail comment matters beyond the meeting room. The Dakota Rail Regional Trail already runs through Orono as part of its route between Wayzata and communities further west, and the city is one of the stops where Three Rivers Park District keeps the trail plowed through winter. Staff confirmed at the same meeting that Orono park staff already handle snow plowing along that stretch. If a Loose Line connection eventually links up with it, Hackberry Park's neighborhood sits closer to that regional trail conversation than a lot of residents may realize.
What This Actually Means If You Use the Park
None of this changes what's usable at Hackberry Park right now. The two existing fields are still open for reservation through the city, at $15 for Orono residents and $25 for non-residents, and that process hasn't been affected by the recent change order. What the fence removal signals is site prep for restroom access, not for a new playing surface. If you walk or drive past and see the concrete pad go in before you see any grading for a new field, that's the sequence the city itself has scoped, not a delay you're imagining.
The more useful takeaway is about expectations. A $1.1 million construction budget technically covers 2025 and 2026, but the commission, whose role is advisory, was still raising unresolved concerns about tree removal and Willow Drive traffic as of last fall. Pickleball courts that were supposed to be built by 2025 are still waiting on half a million dollars in donations that haven't materialized, at a site that might not even be the final location. If you're the kind of resident who checks in on local capital projects the way you'd check a weather forecast, the accurate read on Hackberry Park this fall is: restroom infrastructure in progress, ball field construction still pending further commission input, pickleball still an open question with two possible addresses.
Projects like this rarely move in a straight line, and that's worth remembering the next time you see a fence disappear and assume it means the rest is right behind it.
Watching how a city actually spends its capital budget, not just what it publishes in a five-year plan, is part of what it takes to understand a neighborhood beyond the median price you'd find on a listing site. If you're curious how projects like the Hackberry Park revitalization or the Dakota Trail connection could shape property values in Orono over the next few years, Huerkamp Home Group keeps an eye on exactly this kind of local detail across the Twin Cities. Get Your Free Market Valuation whenever you're ready to see what it means for your own address.
