Page 1521 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 14 May 2014
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the public. From dog parks to skate parks, exercise equipment to cricket nets, the ACT provides large numbers of amenities that encourage Canberrans to get out and to be fit and healthy. In my electorate we have seen good investment by the ACT government in building Australia’s largest skate park and more recently a new off-leash dog park facility for small dogs.
The ACT and federal governments have invested millions of dollars over recent years in developing and constructing 20 skate facilities, including six major parks in Woden, Gungahlin, Weston Creek, Civic, Tuggeranong and, of course, Belconnen. These skate parks see consistently high levels of usage throughout the day, even into the night at those parks where lighting is available.
The ACT government is also exploring new ways of providing green spaces and recreation areas that are cost effective, maximise the utility of available land and provide high-quality facilities for our community. One example of this new way of thinking is the community recreation irrigated park in Crace. In the original planning for the suburb of Crace, a site was allocated for the construction of a traditional neighbourhood oval with approximately 2.5 hectares of irrigated playing surface. The suburb of Crace, though, has no school; therefore the neighbourhood oval would have provided very limited formal sporting options due to the size of the facility. A better community outcome was sought through the development of a community recreation irrigated park.
The park concept forms part of a new sportsground provision model for greenfield suburbs. The new provision model details that equipment should be provided in suburbs where there is no district playing field, district park or a government school oval. The facilities that are provided in the Crace community park include a basketball or futsal court with perimeter lighting and fencing, a netball half-court, a tennis wall, a synthetic cricket wicket, outdoor gymnasium equipment, a range of structures and design—
At 6 pm, in accordance with standing order 34, the debate was interrupted. The motion for the adjournment of the Assembly having been put and negatived, the debate was resumed.
MS BERRY: I think I was up to the design treatments for skating and rollerblading in the park, a children’s playground, a picnic area including barbecues, shelters and toilets, and a flat irrigated open grass area of approximately 0.8 of a hectare for a range of recreation activities. The Crace community park has been designed to attract a broad range of users rather than just organised sporting groups, and to promote physical activity for the health and wellbeing of residents in that local region. I know from my own experience, as my children and I have been fairly regular visitors to the park, that it is quite a popular place for families to travel to, to use some of those fantastic facilities.
Larger district playing fields will continue to be strategically provided to cater for the training and competition requirements of the sports industry. The provision of further community recreation irrigated parks in Casey and yet to be determined suburbs
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