Louisville has scored near the bottom on a new ranking of park systems in the nation’s 40 largest cities. The city came in 38th.

The Trust for Public Land scored the park systems on criteria including park size, the city’s investments in the parks and park access, which measures the percentage of residents living with a half-mile of a park. On a scale of zero to five park benches, Louisville received one lonely park bench.

The city did well on measurements of park size, thanks to behemoths like the Frederick Law Olmsted-designed Cherokee and Shawnee parks, but the city didn’t do so well on park access.

Peter Harnick of the Trust for Public Land says some of the problems identified by the report can be traced back to Louisville’s city-county merger.

“When you have a small city that goes back a couple hundred years when people were almost walking distance from their parks, and then you merge with your surrounding county and pick up tremendous acreage of suburban and relatively undeveloped and almost rural land, of course that’s going to put a challenge to get everybody within a ten minute walk to their park,” he says.

John Hamilton, Assistant to the Director at Metro Parks, agrees with the assessment that merger did complicate the city’s park access, thought he notes that absorbing suburbs did add several valuable parks to the city’s inventory.

Besides the city’s acreage issue, Hamilton concedes that Louisville’s per capita park spending and number of playgrounds is much lower than other cities. But he predicts future projects will eventually help improve the city’s score.

“21st Century Parks is going to make a great deal of difference,” he said. “So is the Louisville Loop. When you think about building a 105 mile track around the city, thousands of people are going to be within minutes of the Louisville Loop.”

The only cities ranked below Louisville were Charlotte, North Carolina and Fresno, California. San Francisco got the highest rating. To see the rankings, visit the Park Score website.

About 14 percent of registered voters in Kentucky cast ballots Tuesday in primary battles on the federal, state and city levels. Here’s a rundown of the results:

Federal

• More than 40 Percent of Kentucky Democratic Voters Choose “Uncommitted” Over Obama
• Massie Decisively Wins Fourth Congressional District Primary

State

• Only One Incumbent Defeated in Legislative Primaries
• McGarvey Wins Democratic Nod in 19th District Senate Race
• Meeks Beats Tea Party Candidate in State House Primary

City

• Scott Easily Wins District 1 Primary
• Shanklin Overcomes Scandal to Win Primary
• Incumbent Owen Wins Democratic Nod for Eighth District Council Seat
• Fowler and Heuglin Will Face Off For 14th District Metro Council Seat
• Tea Party Candidate Defeats Incumbent Jon Ackerson In Metro Council Upset
• Wine Wins Commonwealth’s Attorney Race

Despite having no official challenger in Kentucky’s Democratic primary, President Obama won less than 60 percent of the vote. The rest of the votes went to…no one.

With only about a 14 percent turnout statewide, about 42 percent of voters in the Democratic primary voted for “uncommitted” rather than choose President Obama. The president won many of the counties in the central and northern parts of the state, but voters in the far eastern and western regions overwhelming refused to support him.

Earlier this month, Mr. Obama won only 60 percent of the primary in West Virginia, where his opponent was a convicted felon. In Oklahoma, an anti-abortion activist won 20 percent of the vote against the president in that state’s primary.

Former Judge Thomas Wine has won the four-way Democratic primary to be Jefferson County’s newest Commonwealth’s Attorney.

Wine beat out Carol Cobb, Steve Ryan and Tom Van De Rostyne by more than 2,000 votes. Because no Republican is vying for the seat, Wine is expected to be the first new attorney in the top prosecutor’s office in 15 years.

Wine says his experience as a circuit court judge and appeals court judge played a role in his victory. Current Commonwealth’s Attorney Dave Stengel is retiring.

State Representative Reginald Meeks thumped Tea Party challenger Wendy Caswell in Tuesday’s Democratic primary.

Meeks carried 80 percent of the vote in the race for the state House’s 42nd District seat, which covers parts of Old Louisville, downtown and the West End. Caswell is the founder and former president of the Louisville Tea Party, who said she has always been a registered Democrat.

Meeks said Caswell was a fraud and he pressured party leaders to file suit against her candidacy, though they never did.

No Republican is vying for the seat.

Louisville Metro Councilwoman Barbara Shanklin has won a chance for re-election despite a scandal involving her legislative aide being arrested and jailed dozens of times.

A week before the election it was reported that Shanklin’s grandson, 28-year-old Gary Bohler, remained employed as her assistant despite multiple arrests for drug trafficking, robbery and domestic violence. It was also revealed that Bohler was paid while in jail at one point, and was still being compensated as a fugitive with active warrants.

Shanklin initially suspended Bohler without pay, but later fired her grandson.

In Tuesday’s Democratic primary, challengers Rose Robinson and Yvonne Woods split opposition to Shanklin, who won with only 48 percent of the vote.

No Republican is vying for the seat.

Louisville Metro Councilwoman Attica Woodson Scott will likely retain her District 1 seat after winning a five-way Democratic primary battle.

The council appointed Scott to the position last year to replace former Councilwoman Judy Green, who was booted from office for ethics violations. Scott beat out her four challengers with 49 percent of the vote.

Scott says focusing on environmental justice and vacant properties resonated with voters, but that public safety is a key priority in the area. A rash of shootings in west Louisville last week brought new scrutiny to crime issues in the district.

The closest challenger to Scott was former police officer Ray Barker, who garnered 24 percent of the vote and won two precincts. Barker had run for the seat twice before and had also applied for the position in 2006 and 2010. He brought the initial ethics complaint against Green that resulted in her removal.

The election is for the remainder of Green’s term until 2014. No Republican is vying for the seat.

Tea Party challenger Marilyn Parker defeated incumbent Metro Councilman Jon Ackerson in a tight Republican primary in the 18th Council District.

The contest caught observers’ attention after most GOP council members endorsed Parker over Ackerson, claiming the incumbent sided with Democrats in key debates. Ackerson led most of the night Tuesday, but final counts showed Parker beating the incumbent by 37 votes.

Parker will face Democrat Teague Ridge in the fall campaign, but the district is heavily Republican, making Parker the early favorite in the general election.

Parker says she wants to see major cuts to council discretionary spending and tighter ethics rules.

“One of the first things that I would like to address is the slush funds since we have a $20 million budget shortfall right now. I would like to address the slush funds, the discretionary spending that each council member has at their disposal,” she says.

Parker is favored to win the heavily Republican registered district, but critics have already pointed out her controversial such as questioning President Obama’s birth certificate. But Ackerson says he will support Parker and help her with the transition if she wins in the general election, but will retire after that.

“I would say I’m done. I’ve done my time, it’s time to get my gold watch and to check out and to move on to other things,” says Ackerson. “I do not see myself running for office in the future. I’ve run for a number of years and I think it’s time to let new people like Marilyn Parker take over,”

The race marks only the second time an elected council incumbent has been defeated. In 2010, Democrat David Yates defeated Republican Doug Hawkins in the 25th District race.

Morgan McGarvey has won the Democratic nomination for Kentucky’s 19th Senate district.

McGarvey is an attorney in private practice in Louisville who ran on a platform of building the Ohio River Bridges Project and expanding the state’s tax base. During the campaign, he racked up endorsements from former State Auditor Crit Luallan, Attorney General Jack Conway, and state Senator Tim Shaughnessy, who currently holds the seat and isn’t running for re-election. McGarvey’s website also touts his support of biodiesel.

McGarvey beat environmental engineer Sarah Lynn Cunningham by about 750 votes. Neither of the other two contenders—attorney Amy Shoemaker and golf instructor Gary Demling—got more than 15 percent of the vote.

Because there is no Republican challenger in the race, McGarvey will likely win the seat in November by default.

At least one incumbent member of the Kentucky House will not be returning to Frankfort next year.

Republican-turned-Democrat Wade Hurt has lost his primary to union activist Jeff Donohue. Wade ran as a Republican in 2010 against Donohue, who has remained a Democrat. Hurt switched parties shortly after that election, saying it would help him better serve his district.

No other incumbent House or Senate members lost their seats to primary challengers, though some will face tough re-election battles in the general election.

In two open races, Democrat Morgan McGarvey won the nomination in 19^th District, where no Republican is running. Chris Girdler won the GOP primary for the 15^th state Senate District, and has no Democratic opposition.