Rail Creek Park has long been envisioned as a bike-centric park and, above all, a park that serves the City of Shawnee. Resident surveys done to help create the city’s Achieve Shawnee Comprehensive Plan showed that bike facilities and multi-use trails were a top priority, and the City is responding.

“The proposed Rail Creek Park will provide high-quality shared use paths and training areas for bicyclists of a variety of experience levels. The shared-use path system will be integrated throughout the wooded area surrounding the fields…and connect to the existing Mill Creek Streamway trails.” - Achieve Shawnee 2021 (updated 2025)

We are in the early stages of the master planning process for the park, which means that while we are gathering a wide range of input, no decisions have been made about exactly which elements will or will not be included in the new park. This process includes:

• Reaching out to the people of Shawnee directly at community events to hear what other types of elements they may want to see in Shawnee’s next park.
• Deploying an online public opinion survey that will be sent to all Shawnee residents.
• Conducting a thorough economic analysis of potential revenue-generating park elements.
• Studying the site itself to determine what is possible on the site, and what isn’t.