{"id":441960,"date":"2026-10-29T23:30:10","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T23:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/441960\/"},"modified":"2026-10-29T23:30:10","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T23:30:10","slug":"cape-coral-to-weigh-historic-status-for-four-freedoms-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/441960\/","title":{"rendered":"Cape Coral to weigh historic status for Four Freedoms Park"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Jaylen<\/a>CAPE CORAL, Fla. \u2014<\/p>\n

A Cape Coral father is fighting to preserve Four Freedoms Park by nominating it for historic designation as the site faces demolition due to the approved Bimini East development plan. <\/p>\n

The Madden family discovered the park years ago during a visit to Cape Coral through a random Google search. Since then, it has become a significant part of their lives. Their children attended the Four Freedoms VPK program, where they grew up, made friends, and learned from their teachers. <\/p>\n

With the Bimini East development moving forward, the preschool building and park are slated to be torn down, though the playground will be relocated by the developers. <\/p>\n

Louis Madden, a Cape Coral resident, said he nominated Four Freedoms Park for historic designation in hopes of saving it. <\/p>\n

\u201cI want to really know the exact reason why because it falls into every aspect that the City of Cape Coral themselves, establish as a historical location,\u201d Madden said. <\/p>\n

Diana Lidden, a longtime preschool teacher at Four Freedoms, has also expressed her opposition to the development. <\/p>\n

\u201cPlease, please don\u2019t do this,\u201d Lidden said, crying. <\/p>\n

Lidden was moved to tears again as she informed another family that the preschool program would be relocated due to the development<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Cape Coral City Manager Michael Ilczyszyn has reminded residents during council meetings that the preschool program will not be eliminated but will move to a different location. <\/p>\n

Still, many in the community want the park\u2019s history to remain intact for future generations. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the first part of Cape Coral. It\u2019s been here since my day one,\u201d Madden said. \u201cBut sooner or later it came up. It was donated by the Rosen brothers.\u201d <\/p>\n

On Monday, the Cape Coral City Council will decide whether to approve or deny the historic designation for Four Freedoms Park<\/a>. Alternatively, the council could choose to move forward with accepting the nomination.<\/p>\n

DOWNLOAD\u202fthe free\u202fGulf Coast News app<\/a>\u202ffor your latest news and alerts on breaking news, weather, sports, entertainment, and more on your phone or tablet. And check out the Very Local Gulf Coast app<\/a> to stream news, entertainment and original programming on your TV.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CAPE CORAL, Fla. \u2014 A Cape Coral father is fighting to preserve Four Freedoms Park by nominating it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":441961,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[145659,209,5219,211,210,3371,27489,6024,130165,27779,5210,23046,172390,19762,28,29600,172389,30531,139914,172391,172387,147550,3032,172392,172393,2303,172388,172386],"class_list":["post-441960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-bimini-east","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-city-council","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news","tag-cape-coral-resident","tag-city-council-meeting","tag-city-of-cape-coral","tag-community-opposition","tag-council","tag-demolition","tag-development-plan","tag-diana-lidden","tag-father","tag-florida","tag-four-freedoms-park","tag-four-freedoms-vpk","tag-historic","tag-historic-designation","tag-historic-status","tag-louis-madden","tag-michael-ilczyszyn","tag-park","tag-park-preservation","tag-playground-relocation","tag-preschool","tag-preschool-building","tag-rosen-brothers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=441960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/441961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=441960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=441960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=441960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}