NORTH MANKATO — For decades it was corn and soybean fields.

Right now, it’s city-owned land with a couple of ponds, a trail, a lot of grass and some small scattered trees.

But what it might be in a few years — or decades — is coming into focus.

“It’s going to be beautiful some day,” said Joe Kluender, a neighbor to the expansive park land and a member of the citizens committee developing a master plan for the blank slate that is Benson Park.

What it won’t be, according to preliminary plans, is a mass of swing sets, picnic tables, softball diamonds, soccer fields, tennis courts and other standards of municipal parks.

While the plans call for play areas and picnic spots, the goal is to make Benson a destination park for residents from throughout the city and region rather than simply a neighborhood park for the ever-growing residential areas on the city’s north side.

The vision comes from the committee and also from the results of a survey the city sent out earlier this fall.

“We got a lot of feedback from the survey,” said North Mankato Councilwoman Diane Norland, who chairs the city’s Parks Advisory Committee. “The No. 1 interest is trails, so definitely there will be trails for hiking.”

And plenty for the hikers to look at as a variety of natural habitats are created ranging from lake shore to prairie to forest.

Along with the survey results, the plans for the park were driven by the committee’s desire to do something special with a unique opportunity.

What makes the opportunity particularly significant is the park’s size. It’s not as big as Mankato’s 150-acre Sibley Park. At 70 acres, however, Benson is bigger than the sprawling Spring Lake Park (50 acres) in lower North Mankato and larger even than Williams Nature Center (65 acres) on Highway 68 west of Mankato.

And Benson’s undeveloped nature leaves endless options for what the park will become.

Working with a Minneapolis design consultant, the committee came up with three concepts. The first, and the one the committee is leaning toward, is labeled a natural resources park. The second, called an eco-park, is similar in many aspects.

The third was a cultural heritage park and included more structures such as a farm-themed children’s play area, a barn-style interpretive center, crop-demonstration fields and a maple grove with a sugar shack for making syrup. That concept also has an interpretive area and trail to educate visitors about Native American heritage and relationships to the land.

“I thought all three were amazingly wonderful,” Norland said. “I was very enthusiastic about all of them.”

The focus of the committee, though, is on the first with the likelihood of the addition of some elements from the second. A meeting to get thoughts and comments from the public is expected later this winter. Ultimately, the North Mankato City Council will have the final say.

As a natural resources park, Benson would have parking areas only on the edges of the park (off of Carlson Drive and Timm Road). From the lots, numerous trails would lead to a variety of restored natural habitats, including a prairie, a trio of wetlands and a woodland area.

A large oak savanna, along with a lake with natural shoreline, would be centerpieces.

Another key feature would be a “wildplace play area” — constructed of natural materials — where kids could learn about nature while having opportunities to run and climb.

Bridges and a fishing pier would bring park users close to the park’s already-created Ladybug Lake and ponds.

The planning hasn’t reached the stage of specific cost estimates, but the city has a new half-percent local sales tax that is partially dedicated to park development. Some of the key components aren’t particularly expensive, Norland said, citing the prairie restoration and oak savanna.

For those, it’s more a matter of patience as plantings take hold, she said. Others — such as paved trails, restrooms and a lookout tower — would be more expensive but could be implemented over time as revenues are available.

“As the money comes in, we’ll do what we can,” Norland said.

Residents will be able to begin enjoying some of the improvements within a couple of years, Norland and Kluender predicted.

Kluender said the Benson Park Committee is close to a consensus on a plan it hopes the broader Parks Advisory Committee, the public and the council will agree is a good one. The key, even if the park’s features evolve substantially in the upcoming approval process, is to have a plan that will direct the development of Benson over time.

“So over the years there’s a plan being followed and it isn’t just random the way it used to be,” Kluender said.

Specific features aside, Norland said the people involved know what they want to see on that 70-acre piece of canvas when the final brush stroke is made years in the future.

“Our plan is that it be a very high-quality, welcoming, beautiful park,” she said.