Part of the property around the lake across from the Mid-Lothian Mines Park is being developed by Tak Tent L.P. includes additions that it will greatly enhance the county park. Tom Garner, Jr., managing partner of the firm (and president of the Mid-Lothian Mines & Rail Roads Foundation), explained at the June 2011 meeting of the Western Chesterfield Business Alliance how his firm is now planning to construct the 450-seat rustic amphitheater on three acres next to Woolridge Road. This facility will eventually be turned over to the county.
Construction started in November 2011.
Besides the amphitheater there will be a large artistic representation (not a working model) of a coal mining headstock sited on the actual site of a former mine shaft. The overall design of the headstock is inspired by the artwork on the Mid-Lothian Coal Mining Company's stock certificate from the mid-1800s, with years of painstaking historical research, much of it done by Garner, filling out the details. While now on private property being developed by Tak Tent, this new facility has been developed in cooperation with county and state agencies as well as area community groups.
Mr. Garner said the small amphitheater will provide a "very laid-back kind of place" for the Village of Midlothian. The parking lot will not be asphalt, but a natural surface with significant landscaping, with the layout of the parking lot such that school buses can easily be accommodated.
A pedestrian tunnel was built under Woolridge Road when the Mid-Lothian Mines Park and lake were constructed, providing an interesting and safer access between the park and the amphitheater next to the lake. Construction is scheduled to begin in 2011.