Parks/Open Space
Blue Hole Regional Park
Wimberley, Texas
Blue Hole is a quintessential Texas Hill Country swimming hole, with pristine waters, limestone bluffs and towering age-old cypress trees. Extremely popular with locals, when the City of Wimberley purchased it, along with 126 acres around it in 2005, Blue Hole had been almost “loved to death” -- its banks were overrun, compacted and no longer able to support vegetation, including its iconic and bank-stabilizing cypress trees.
Following a stakeholder engagement process and careful land analysis, Design Workshop recommended a park design that would: re-establish native plants and build limestone access points to protect the Blue Hole banks, protect and provide interpretive trail access to the larger site’s ecologically sensitive areas, and introduce 320,000 square feet of new park development and active recreation opportunities. Combined with an operations and maintenance plan, these measures have safeguarded Blue Hole and expanded its appeal for current and future generations.
Services Provided: Park Planning, Public Facilitation & Outreach, Sustainable Development, Landscape Architecture, Signage & Wayfinding, Permitting, Construction Observation
Awards
- Honor Award, Design (Unrealized), ASLA Texas
- Public Works Outstanding Award, Texas Municipal League Public Works
- Honor Award, Research & Communication, ASLA Colorado
- Honor Award, Design (Constructed), ASLA Texas
- SITES Certified (Pilot Project), Sustainable SITES Initiative
- Excellence Award, Center for Active Design
- Project Excellence Award, Society of Outdoor Recreation Professionals (SORP)
- Austin Green Award, Austin Green Awards
Client
City of Wimberley
Collaborators
Taniguchi & Associates, T.F. Harper & Associates, Regenerative Environmental Design, PBS&J, Greenplay, MJ Structures, James Pole, Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, Feuls Inc., Walter P. Moore, Moon Design, Heather Venhaus