Linda Falkenstein
Even co-owner Tyler Leeper was surprised at how quickly Brittingham Boats “became a destination.”
Tyler Leeper was always attracted to Brittingham Park.
“I’d be driving by, wondering what those random canoes were doing on the racks there, and who was going out from there.”
Leeper, co-owner of Wingra Boats (which rents canoes and other watercraft in that near-west-side city park), liked Brittingham’s siting. “It’s a nice balance between the quiet water of Monona Bay and access to the larger lake chain,” he notes. “It seemed like a perfect location: close to downtown, visible, and yet still good for enjoying quiet water sports.”
In 2012, Leeper moved to a home on West Shore Drive, adjacent to Brittingham along the south side of Monona Bay. “Then I recognized that there was a large community waiting for some activity to happen in the park. My neighbors had young children. I saw strollers, people running by every day. It was clear to me that there was a community here, waiting, with nothing to do.”
Leeper and his Wingra Boats partner Stephan Reinke were authorized by the city to operate a boat rental concession and open a cafe out of the long-unused parks department building at Brittingham Beach; they entered into an eight-year contract with the city in 2013. The first task was to start cleaning out the building and turn it into a pleasant place to have a cup of coffee and a sandwich and create places for equipment storage.
“People got excited,” Leeper remembers. “Neighbors came by who said, ‘We don’t want to go out on the lakes, but we’ll buy a membership every year, we’re so happy you guys are here.”
Urban studies theorist Jane Jacobs has argued that parks benefit from various, diverse uses at different times of the day, and from attracting more than one kind of user. Brittingham Boats, which opened in 2013, has been instrumental in pulling in users not just from the immediate neighborhood, but workers from the Square who make the quick trip to the park during lunch hour or after work to paddle or have lunch at the summer cafe. Meriter Hospital employees, who have an unlimited access pass for boat rental, also come often. Even tourists staying at downtown hotels call and ask for directions to the boathouse.
“Within a month we had regulars coming for lunch breaks, going out paddling,” says Leeper. “It surprised everybody, especially me, how quickly it became a destination.”
Leeper notes that from the Square or Monona Terrace, “it’s really easy. It’s about a six-minute walk, but people aren’t used to walking in that direction.”
Lessons and classes are given for standup paddleboarding and standup paddleboard yoga. New this summer, teams will be forming for standup paddleboard polo, in which two teams of three people each use something like a lacrosse stick to scoop up balls. “It’s a non-contact sport; you just have to be willing to get wet,” says Leeper. It’s also fun to watch from shore, he says.
There are also kid day camps held in the park in summer, with introductions to canoeing, kayaking and fishing.
Brittingham Boats has introduced a varied population into the park in the evening as well, with movie nights and monthly full-moon paddles.
Ultimately, Leeper would like to see the city build a new facility for boat rental and the food concession that would also contain meeting space for three area neighborhood associations that currently have no ideal gathering place. He’d also like to see programming increase to year-round activity in the park, especially winter activities.
“What we really do is work to build community,” Leeper says. “We happen to do it by renting out boats, but the main focus is, ‘How do we bring people together?’”
