Drive along the tree line at Hackberry Park this month and the gap is obvious before you can even say what changed. A run of trees that used to shade the third-base line is gone. Chain link stands where there used to be shade. The basketball court and the playground are still there, untouched, but the ground around them looks stripped down to bare dirt and stakes.
If you've wondered what's going on, the short answer is that the city removed the trees on purpose, and the reason has more to do with tree health than aesthetics. According to the city's own construction update, the removals followed an evaluation by a certified arborist working alongside a landscape architect on the park's redesign, and most of what came down were ash trees that were already dead or declining. The replanting plan calls for nearly twice as many trees as were removed, so the bare stretch you're looking at now is a temporary condition, not the finished picture.
A park project that's been on the city's list since February
This isn't a project that appeared out of nowhere. Back in February, Orono's Parks Commission carried the Hackberry revitalization forward as one of its stated priorities for 2026, alongside trail connections and long-range golf course planning. The design work went through Bolton & Menk, the landscape architecture firm that built out multiple concept options and ran them past residents through a feedback survey before the current layout was finalized. The basketball court and playground were protected from the start, and the mailboxes that sit at the edge of the park are staying put on the park side, both details residents flagged during that process.
The most recent piece of the story is smaller and more procedural, but it's the kind of detail that explains why construction fencing sometimes looks like it's expanding rather than shrinking. In August, the city council approved a change order removing 240 linear feet of temporary fencing and replacing part of it with a concrete pad and privacy screening sized to hold up to two portable restrooms, including one ADA-compliant unit. Council members spent real time on whether to add a drinking fountain at the same time. Staff had quotes for a permanent fountain running $14,000 to $18,000, against a simpler spigot or bottle-filler option that staff estimated closer to $5,000. That's the level of detail city government works through on a neighborhood park, and it's a useful reminder that the fence you're driving past reflects an actual sequence of decisions, not just a contractor working at their own pace.
The road project running on the same clock
Hackberry isn't the only thing under construction this season. Highway 12 between Wayzata and Minnetonka has had lane reductions and ramp closures since early April, and as of late September the work is still active, with the city continuing to post traffic impact updates. If you've been taking a different route into Navarre or noticing more backup than usual coming from the Wayzata side, that's the reason.
The two projects aren't connected in any official sense, but they're running on the same calendar, and for a lot of Orono residents they add up to the same experience: familiar routes into town look different right now, whether you're walking to a park or driving to dinner.
A fiber permit comment window that closed September 29
There's a third thread to this fall's construction story, and it's the one most residents haven't seen unless they follow city meeting notices closely. Midco has filed a permit application with the Minnehaha Creek Watershed District to build a fiber-optic network throughout Orono. The window for written requests to bring that permit before the MCWD board closed September 29 at 4:30 p.m. It's an easy detail to miss because it doesn't come with orange cones or a fenced perimeter, but it's the same category of decision as the other two: infrastructure work that determines where crews dig, where conduit runs, and what your street looks like for a few weeks next year.
Three infrastructure stories running at once, one visible at a park, one visible on a highway, one visible only if you read watershed district filings, is not a coincidence so much as a pattern. This is the season Orono is spending on the ground and underground, not on new storefronts.
Where the season still looks like fall, not construction
If you want a version of Orono that hasn't changed, Noerenberg Gardens is still the place. The gardens sit on Crystal Bay, on land that was once the estate of Grain Belt Brewery founder Frederick Noerenberg, and they're managed today by Three Rivers Park District as a formal public garden rather than a city park. The plant list built up over the decades includes a run of later-season bloomers, among them asters, ornamental grasses, and the Fall Daisy that traces back to the original estate plantings, so the garden still has color even as the rest of the calendar turns toward cleanup and construction updates.
The gardens are free to visit and connect to the rest of the city's trail system by a paved path, but the terms of the original donation still apply: no food or beverages inside the garden, no swimming, and no launching or docking boats along that stretch of shoreline. It's a walk, not a picnic spot. The season is also finite. The gardens are open May through October, so the window to see this year's fall planting is measured in weeks, not months.
After the walk, Navarre is still the destination
Once you're back in the car, Navarre remains what it's been for a long time: Orono's primary commercial center, with a municipal parking lot that serves the shops and restaurants clustered there. The names on that stretch haven't been swept up in the season's construction news, and that consistency is worth something on its own. Birch's on the Lake Brewhouse & Supperclub, Buck's Pub, Talavera Mexican Restaurant, 6Smith, and Two Pony Gardens are all still open and still drawing the kind of local reviews that come from repeat customers rather than one-time visitors passing through.
That contrast is really the point of this fall in Orono. The construction fencing at Hackberry, the lane closures on Highway 12, and a watershed district permit application are the parts of the neighborhood actively changing right now. Noerenberg Gardens and the restaurants in Navarre are the parts holding steady while that happens. Knowing which is which makes the detour, the fence, and the extra ten minutes on Highway 12 a lot easier to read, because none of it means something is going wrong. It means several long-planned projects landed on the calendar at the same time, and by next year, Hackberry's tree line will likely be fuller than it was before anyone started cutting.
If you're curious about how projects like these tend to affect property values or timing in Orono, Kelly Bollinger is always happy to talk through what's changing on the ground here and what it means for your own plans.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
