FREMONT — Neighbors of a newly proposed community park in Fremont worry that if city officials build it, cricket will come.
Preliminary blueprints for the 13-acre Palm Avenue Community Park show possible plans for a cricket field for youth along with green space, a playground, picnic tables, public restrooms and a parking lot. But a group of neighbors are concerned the sport – created in England involving a bat and ball and one of the most popular sports in the world – could pose dangers to passersbys, vehicles and homes.
“It just seems so negligent to us,” said Phil Leung, one of several neighborhood residents rallying against the proposed cricket field. “It’s just like ‘Field of Dreams.’ If you build it, people will come.”
Fremont Parks Planning and Design Manager Tara Bhuthimethe said the city is simply trying to “design parks where all ages will be included and encouraged to use” them.
“We don’t have a lot of parks that can take a cricket field,” Bhuthimethe said this week. “We have a known demand for that use.”
In a statement, city spokeswoman Geneva Bosques said that cricket was one of the top requests from residents in a recent city survey gauging public interest in the park. She wrote that the city has done “extensive outreach” to gather input from residents about the park, has heard from the residents concerned about a cricket field and said that “safety is our #1 priority.”
The city has another cricket facility in Central Park, with synthetic turf, lights, benches and rental fees for leagues and private events, but “cannot meet the reservation requests for organized cricket play and youth cricket participation continues to grow,” Bosques said. “Adding a youth-only cricket field to the citywide park system would help meet that emerging need.”
While officials have still not decided whether to allow cricket at Palm Avenue Community Park, some sort of sports field or complex will almost certainly be built there to “meet industry safety standards.” A 750-square-foot barn, believed to have been built as early as 1905, will remain, city officials said.
But nearby homeowners are worried flying cricket balls — which each weigh about five ounces — could injure a child or elderly person or damage homes or cars.
“I don’t see how this is really needed, Leung said. “We’re not against cricket, it’s just way too close … You can’t use the park for any other purpose if you have cricket games going at the same time.”
A previous city survey laid out the top requests for features for the new park from residents, which included a looped walking trail, public restrooms, parking and other things. Cricket did not appear anywhere near the top of the list, and cricket critics wonder how the sport made it into the park’s plans.
Another park neighbor, Vinod Chandrashekaran, said “it seems this whole effort has been beholden to one single interest group.” As an immigrant from India, he played on street corners in his home country as a child, and has passed his love for the sport on to his son. But he worries the field will draw crowds that take over the park and parking on neighborhood streets.
“I just don’t think this location is a great fit for a cricket field,” he said. But, he added, “To me, honestly, the damage is done … I don’t really have trust in the (city planning department), nor the process at this point,” Chandrashekaran said.
Hemant Buch, founder of Fremont’s California Cricket Academy, told this news organization that he sees the field as a benefit for the community and his students. He acknowledged concerns about the dangers of a hard, leather-bound cricket ball but said that kids under 15 years old play with a tennis ball instead of a professional adult ball. He also said he has never seen an injury from a cricket ball in his 23 years of coaching the sport.
Most importantly, he said, it will help meet the rising demand for the sport in the region, where there are dozens of youth teams and over a dozen in Fremont. The demand is so great, he said, that two new fields are needed.
“We need to call upon the community to really rally behind this project and forget about small inconveniences that they may get, such as more cars driving around their neighborhood,” Buch said.
Fremont Mayor Raj Salwan this week said that the new park is “a rare and exciting opportunity for Fremont” in “a part of the city that has long needed more recreational space.” The City Council, which hasn’t yet discussed the park plans, will make its final decision based on “comprehensive data, safety analysis, and community feedback,” he wrote in a statement.
“Parks of this size don’t come along often, and when they do, they allow us to think big, plan for future generations, and create a space that brings people together,” Salwan said.
The city is accepting responses to a second survey about the park through Sunday.
The City Council is expected to discuss the community feedback and give input on the park’s progress in the early quarter of next year. Officials are planning to start construction sometime in 2027, with an estimated opening date in 2028. City Councilman Yang Shao, who represents the Mission San Jose district where the park is located, did not return a request for comment.