Framed by capstans of the Sprague riverboat, a City of Vicksburg Street Department track hoe is used to dump concrete into a truck Wednesday off Levee Street, across from the Vicksburg floodwall and mural project. Over the next two days, the concrete is to be removed from the site where the former McGuffie Steel building once stood. The work is in preparation for a $2.3 million project that will include a steamboat park, a children’s splash park and interactive river displays. Anchoring the project will be a steamboat playground with interactive displays showing the history of river transportation, a pilot house, bells and other steamboat-related features. Other improvements along Levee Street between Grove and Clay streets will be the construction of public restrooms, benches and landscaping. The park project will be funded by the $17.5 million bond issue the City of Vicksburg Board of Mayor and Aldermen authorized in November 2001. The money is also being used for urban renewal across downtown Vicksburg.(Melanie Duncan Thortis The Vicksburg Post)