For over two years the Walter Scott family, one of Nebraska’s most wealthy, has been attempting to close facilities on the east side of Cunningham Lake & Recreation Area.

At 380 water acres, Cunningham Lake is the largest reservoir in the Papio Creek watershed, and the park is 1,526 acres in total area. The Scott family owns much of the land bordering the east side of the rec area. Some of the best recreational facilities at the lake, including two picnic shelters, fishing access and a playground, are located along the east shore. Sierra Club is opposed to this closure.

In the fall of 2003, in exchange for donating $1 million to build an unpaved trail around the lake, the family wanted all the existing facilities on the east side of the lake removed, including the largest and most popular picnic shelter and fishing access. The Rainwood Drive access would be closed, and it's likely the west half mile of Rainwood leading to the lake would also be closed because the Scott family owns the land on both sides of the road.

Between the campground on the southeast corner and Highway 36 on the north, a distance of about 3.5 miles, the only access to the east side of the lake would be by a pedestrian/bike trail. The Scott family wanted all facilities (except the new trail) removed and the area returned to a “natural state.”

The proposed trail would be limestone chips much like the Wabash Trace, a surface not suitable for many urban uses such as road bikes, strollers, roller blades, wheelchairs, etc. There are several segments of existing paved trail near the lake, and some of those segments might be included in the new trail. But most of these trail segments are in disrepair, and parts of the original trail system are under water or washed away.

At a public meeting at Northwest High School on Nov. 19, 2003, attended by more than 40 residents, participants voted 23 to 17 to turn down the $1 million gift with the strings attached. Instead, the public asked the City of Omaha to move forward with a more modest plan to spend the $250,000 already available to rehab some of the existing facilities. Hopefully, other funds will become available at a later date to pay for a paved trail around the lake.

In early 2005 the Scott Family moved on to Plan B – ask the Omaha City Council and Douglas County Board to close the segment of Rainwood Road past their properties, which would cut off the only road access to the east shore of the lake. In spring 2005 the City Council referred the issue to the County Board because Rainwood is a county road¬. The County Board tabled the closure because the county engineer said the agreement with the Army Corps of Engineers, who financed construction of the lake, required that the access road be kept open.

Supporters of the Scott plan say that there are few users of the east shore facilities. It’s true that Cunningham Lake as a whole sees fewer visitors than most of the other Papio lakes, because the number of people living in near-proximity is lower than other lake parks. However, that is about to change. Part of the watershed has just recently become available for development, with an interceptor sewer extension planned as part of the 2005 sewer plan update. More neighboring residents mean more park users, which means more park access is needed, not less.

Many of the current users of the Rainwood Road access are north and north-central Omaha residents. Many are families, but there are also many older Omahans with limited physical abilities that use Rainwood to get to fishing and picnicking areas that are easily accessible at this location.

Rainwood Road brings people into the mid-point of the east side of the lake. There are some unique aspects about this -- one of the most important is the sunset view across the water. It is not possible to experience this to a comparable quality from any other location. From the north, by Highway 36, Williams Pipeline interferes with its rattling noises and security lighting, as well as the highway noise. How do you put a dollar value on the sunset being taken away from the public view?

The west side of Cunningham Lake has more access points, and some have very few users. Observation indicates that the Rainwood Road access to be one of the three most used in the park. Nothing else exists for easy access on the east side. The camping area is only for registered campers, and is gated to keep everyone out during the six-month off-season. The north access off of Highway 36 is across from an industrial use (Williams Pipeline) with accompanying noises and security lights. From the Highway 36 parking lot on the north side, it takes a walk of two-thirds mile to get close to the water again by using the trail to get to the east side.

A watershed management plan is under way to ensure that as development occurs, the water quality at Cunningham will be protected. Nebraska Game and Parks is coordinating with that effort to make improvements to the quality and accessibility of fisheries. Views will also be protected in order to maintain the scenic value of the lake and park.

What is the point of these efforts if one of the most popular fishing spots — Rainwood Road access — is made more difficult to access by requiring a one and a half mile hike?

Cunningham Lake has the potential to be a gem in the Omaha’s open space system, being larger than the other flood-control lakes and having a scenic setting, especially with the watershed plans and water quality efforts under way at this time.

Unfortunately, as the very first flood-control lake built in the series, the recreation amenities were built to a lesser standard than is currently done (e.g. Lake Zorinsky and the current upgrade and rehabilitation at Standing Bear). As a result, 35 years later, the park is badly in need of rehabilitation, but very little funding has been identified -- no more than is minimally programmed for rehab of much smaller parks. Rather than “writing off” a significant area of the park to ease the financial burden and win points with a wealthy family, the direction should be to play up the importance and the potential for the park to be a gem that is especially critical to the activity and health of the residents of north-central Omaha. People from all other areas also use the park. Extraordinary efforts should be taken to raise funds that would help restore the valued uses of the park and lake.

If that is not done, and the choice is given as either minimal rehabilitation while keeping this access vs. more park improvements with significant reduction in accessibility to this point, many park users would choose less improvement as evidenced by the two park plan meetings in 2003. What good does it do to have something that is fixed up but doesn’t give people what they actually want and need.

Sierra Club leaders and concerned members will continue to fight attempts by the Scott family and other to close the Rainwood Road access to the lake and remove the recreational facilities on the east shore. For more information contact Clyde Anderson at (402) 932-7225 ClydeLAnderson@cox.net or Carole Larson at (402) 558-4663 researchercl@yahoo.com.

This article originally appeared in the January 2006 issue of the Missouri Valley Sierran