Staff Writer

The way to the waves is finished at Pine Point and the beach access area will soon have a new name.

“Snowberry Ocean View Park” was chosen from 191 entries because it reflects the history and vantage point of the 13,000-square-foot park, said Town Council Chairman Carol Rancourt. Councilors were expected to vote Wednesday, after the Leader print deadline, on the resolution to name the park.

The entries were judged by a panel of Rancourt, Pine Point resident Elaine Richer and Rodney Laughton of the Scarborough Historical Society, Rancourt said.

“I was happy we had such participation, especially because we were not giving away a prize,” she added.

Rancourt said the panel evaluated suggestions that included naming the park for aviator Charles Lindbergh and Stephen Delano, the Scarborough High School senior who died in a May 8 traffic accident on Payne Road.

Lindbergh had intended to land his airplane, The Spirit of St. Louis, in Scarborough during a 1927 visit. Foggy conditions led to a landing on the beach in Old Orchard Beach, and Lindbergh flew to an airfield near what is now the Scarborough Public Works complex on Washington Avenue the next day.

Eventually, the panel decided on a name that the history of Snowberry Park, a complex with an amusement park and restaurant on both sides of the confluence of Pine Point Road and King Street, Laughton said.

The restaurant and gift shop eventually were sold to the Truman family and became the Lighthouse Inn. The amusement park remained open until 1964, Laughton said.

Located between the Lighthouse Inn and Beach Walk subdivision, the beach access area stretches from a vehicle drop-off zone to sand path leading to the beach. Construction of the access area began in the spring and will be completed in a second phase by next spring.

The work was done as part of a wider project to add sidewalks, narrow traffic lanes and add crosswalks to the area where Pine Point Road curves into King Street.

The walkway, bicycle rack and water fountain have been installed, as has a split rail fence. The second phase of the $98,000 project will include additional landscaping. The park design was finalized after three winter workshops led by Town Manager Tom Hall.

Plans also call for installation of signs with information about the history of the area. The project was approved by councilors in April, and $35,000 from the fiscal year 2011 capital improvements bond paid for a portion of the total construction cost.

Councilors also voted in favor of shifting $146,000 of $219,000 in 2008 bond money needed to repave Broadturn Road to help pay for the remainder of the beach access area and road construction and reconfiguration.

The land used for beach access came from a trade of parcels councilors approved last August. A 19,000-square-foot strip of town land known as Depot Street, which separates the Lighthouse Inn from its parking lot, was traded to inn owners Nicholas and Peter Truman in exchange for their parking lot.

The deal was opposed by area residents, including those in the Pine Point Resident’s Association who called it a one-sided deal that favored the Truman brothers. They contended the loss of Depot Street as a beach drop-off zone would be detrimental to public access.

Before the council considered the new name for the beach access area, planning board members unanimously approved amendments Monday to the site plan for the adjacent Lighthouse Inn.

Assistant Town Planner Jay Chace alerted inn owners Nicholas and Peter Truman in May that a section of stockade fence installed at the edge of the parking lot and an L-shaped wooden wall built near the entrance to the parking lot were not part of the inn site plan Planning Board approved last November.

In response, Peter Truman told Chace in a letter the 8-foot-high fence and 4-foot-high wall were sited on original inn property as opposed to the section of land received in the land swap, and they were not aware approval was needed for construction.