With Audubon Park's redesigned golf course proving to be a big hit and the new golf clubhouse due for completion this spring, Audubon officials are turning their attention to developing a new master plan for the park.

The process will begin with a public meeting Jan. 13 at 7 p.m. in the Audubon Tea Room, just downriver from the main entrance to Audubon Zoo. At the meeting, the public will be asked for suggestions on what issues and activities the plan should address.

The plan is not expected to recommend radical changes in the way the park looks or is used.

Instead, according to an announcement on the Audubon Nature Institute's Web site, the focus will be on "enhancements and improvements in the quality and consistency of the existing facilities and uses within Audubon Park."

The nonprofit institute operates the park, the zoo, the Audubon Aquarium of the Americas, and other parks and facilities for the Audubon Commission, a city agency.

The master plan, which will cover the parts of Audubon Park outside the zoo, is expected to be completed by the end of the year. It will replace a land-use plan for the park adopted several years ago.

Among the issues the master plan is likely to consider:

-- The park's infrastructure, such as drainage, lighting, playgrounds, restrooms, shelters and fountains.

-- Athletic facilities, including the golf course, swimming pool, soccer and baseball fields, tennis courts and stables.

-- Vehicular and pedestrian movement, including the jogging path, Magazine Street, park roads, trails and parking.

-- Safety and security in the park.

-- Planting, maintenance and removal of trees.

-- Environmental issues, such as landscaping, animal habitats, water quality and maintenance programs for plants and grass.

-- Signs and other ways of communicating information to park users.

After the Jan. 13 meeting, Audubon officials will continue to accept written and e-mailed comments until Feb. 15. The park's staff and consultants will use the comments from the meeting and those submitted later in writing the master plan.

In a few months, when the plan is about 50 percent to 70 percent complete, a second public meeting will be held to let the public comment on the work done so far.

When the plan is about 95 percent complete, a third public meeting will give the public a final chance to comment, after which the plan will be presented to the Audubon Commission for adoption.

More information on the process is available at www.auduboninstitute.org/thepark

Save Audubon Park, a group formed in 2001 to oppose rebuilding of the golf course and construction of the clubhouse, has long called for creation of a master plan for the park.

But it seems unlikely that the new effort will satisfy the group, especially because it comes only after the commission made what Save Audubon Park sees as three crucial decisions: to rebuild the course, the largest single element in the park, as well as to build the new clubhouse and to demolish the former Heymann Memorial Conservatory.