It took an Aspinwall homemaker, a retired attorney, a river trail proponent and more to pull off what is arguably the quickest coup to snatch up a rare piece of prime riverfront property along the Allegheny River.

More than just mettle and a good idea, area residents seized the opportunity to raise $2.3 million in just over six months to buy the Aspinwall Marina recently to turn the 8-acre parcel into a public park and trail.

The mammoth undertaking required exhaustive research, real estate legal expertise, support by the county, state, foundations and a healthy roster of volunteers to raise awareness, drum up support and reel in the money.

"There are plans for trails all along the river front of the Allegheny River," said Davitt Woodwell, executive vice president of the western region of the nonprofit Pennsylvania Environmental Council.

"You watch the landscape and watch for things to become available," he said.

Woodwell also sits on the board of Friends of the Riverfront, which was the buyer of the marina, representing area residents. Friends, a South side-based nonprofit, has been developing waterfront trails for two decades.

"I think that what is different and made it possible for the purchase of the Aspinwall Marina was the level of cash and commitment from the community. And that had a major impact on the philanthropic community and government agencies," Woodwell said.

While most trails and property purchases are led by a government agency or an environmental non-profit, that was not the case with the Aspinwall deal.

"Frankly this was a community-led process and is different than a lot of acquisition projects with a land trust or a conservancy," said Woodwell. In this case, it really was this community saying ‘we've been cut off and we want to get back to the river' and they made sure everybody knew it."

Aspinwall resident Susan Crookston came up with the idea of buying the marina for a public park after she heard that UPMC St. Margaret was interested in the land to develop into a parking lot last year.

Crookston, a wife and mother of three children and former head of the Fox Chapel District Association, started researching purchasing the property and enlisted the help of retired real estate attorney Ed Seifert, 73, of O'Hara, who was employed with the Pittsburgh law firm Reed Smith for 43 years.

Seifert is a former president of the board of the Fox Chapel Area Land Trust.

When Crookston contacted Seifert about buying the marina, he was intrigued.

"It was a unique piece of real estate and it seemed like a good cause," he said. "And it was something in my community."

But Seifert thought it would be a difficult project.

"The project needed to be approached carefully so that nobody got hurt if it didn't work because it was a real long shot and anyone in September of 2010 would have said that. At that time, we didn't even have a deal with the owner and had just started to talk," he said.

But when Seifert saw community people along with government and foundations interested, the combination of support looked promising.

Then, they were able to reach a deal with marina owner David Kushon, whose family owned the site for decades, to buy the property for $2.3 million, which was, of course, better than the original list price of $2.5 million.

"Susan's persistence paid off," Seifert said. "And he (Kushon) liked the idea that our plans called for continuing the marina. He had justifiable pride in the marina and he liked the idea that the property was going to be preserved."

But Crookston would have to raise $2.3 million by Sept. 1 to complete the deal, giving her just more than six moths.

Then the fundraising began with a Mom Prom, Beatles gala, kids selling lemonade and residents selling T-shirts. Crookston and other volunteers dove into a flurry of community fundraising events as well as presentations to foundations and government officials for grants.

Crookston was showing up at local meetings, garden clubs, foundations and people's back yards promoting the marina project.

"Just being a housewife and not representing an organization you can get a whole lot done," says Crookston, who poured 10 months of her life shepherding the project and building an army of volunteers.

"We didn't have formal meetings," she said. "I'm not a big believer in a lot of meetings. And I purposely did not have an organization because I didn't want people to feel like they had to join something to participate."

There's more to Crookston than an unassuming homemaker manner.

She holds an undergraduate degree in ethics and social policy from Duke University, an MBA from the University of Virginia and attended the London School of Economics. She has worked in Parliament in England, at a homeless shelter and has developed four start-up businesses.

Crookston and a strong cast of volunteers from neighboring communities were able to raise the $2.3 million with major donations from foundations and government. More than 2,500 individuals contributed, including $14,000 raised by children alone.

Now Crookston is consulting with a new nonprofit, Aspinwall River Front Park Inc.to develop the marina site.

Although she admits that her passion for the marina project cost her precious time with her family she said:"It was the right thing to do.

"It's been a privilege to be involved."