Temporary municipal parking at Saccarappa Park on downtown Westbrook’s Main Street will cease Sept. 30. The city plans to re-establish the former park. The free parking garage can be seen in the background. Robert Lowell / American Journal

Westbrook has plans to re-establish Saccarappa Park effective Sept. 30. The Main Street park has been closed and used as a temporary parking lot. The lot, with 75 spaces, opened at the park in April two years ago when the Mechanic Street parking lot closed, allowing construction to begin on the new, free parking garage.

The parking garage, costing $21 million with 400 spaces, is on Vertical Way that links Mechanic Street to William Clarke Drive.

The park abuts a brick apartment building, Bridge Street and a boardwalk along the Presumpscot River. The city’s long-range plans for the park were undetermined this week.

The City Council Monday voted 6-0, with board Vice President Anne Turcotte absent, to approve a vendor list for a park cleanup. The project qualified for a $450,000 state Brownfields revolving loan fund grant. Councilor Jenn Munro made the motion to approve a vendor list and Councilor Gary Rairdon seconded the motion.

The Brownfields program provides money to clean up contaminated properties, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“Earlier this year the City Council accepted $900,000 from the Maine Department of Economic and Community Development’s Revolving Loan Fund for the Saccarappa Park Redevelopment Project, in the form of a $450,000 grant with no match requirements, and a $450,000 low-interest loan (1% over 20 years) to be repaid through TIF funds,” Acting Mayor David Morse said Tuesday in an email to the American Journal.

Morse said the park site has a long history of industrial uses back to the 1800s including as a sawmill and a silk factory. “More recently it was an automotive garage,” Morse said. “These prior uses qualify it for Brownfields assistance funds from the state.”

The city hopes to break ground on the cleanup in the spring or summer  of 2025. “We are seeking bids right now for qualified environmental professional services to ensure the Brownfields requirements are met,” Morse said. “This will include public engagement for plans, which may include a multi-functional, year-round public amenity at the site. ”

Discover Downtown Westbrook, an advocacy group that sponsors events, this week called re-establishing the park “big news.”

“Discover Downtown Westbrook will work closely with the City of Westbrook to understand what is possible and help facilitate next steps with the space,” Abby Wilson, downtown event coordinator, and Amy Pulaski, downtown executive secretary, said in a joint statement.

The downtown group says it will actively participate in planning the long-term features in the park.

“We have had an initial meeting already, and expect to schedule additional meetings in the coming weeks,” Wilson and Pulaski said.

The site morphed into a park following urban renewal that demolished two buildings there. Mike Sanphy, president of Westbrook Historical Society and former mayor, recalled, besides a gas station, the site included a small building that once housed the city’s Democratic Party headquarters, and a minor municipal parking lot with a truck area where public works once dumped plowed snow into the river.

Saccarappa, once the name of the village that became Westbrook, derives its name from the Abenaki language that means “falling from the rising sun,” according to westbrookmaine.com.