Parks

New Park coming-adjacent to the New Dr. Knox School!

Glenmore Meeting Regarding Parks & Facilities

(from minutes of public meeting 04/06/2005)

Lorna Rowland began with a discussion about the “Partners in Parks” program, which has successfully built a number of parks and outdoor recreation facilities in Kelowna. One example is Ben Lee Park, where most of the money came from fundraising in the community and the City looked after the administration

Questions came from the audience about a skateboard park for Glenmore. These are quite expensive –the one at Ben Lee was $350,000. It is difficult to find a place to put a skateboard park, because while the actual footprint of the park is not that big, there needs to be adequate buffer zones and parking. Skateboard Parks cannot be built on school property.

Harold Zinger commented that it would be great to have a community hall with sports fields and a skateboard park for Glenmore. Downtown, Mission and Rutland all have multiplex facilities. A request for land acquisition for a large piece of property for a project like this should go to City staff and Council.

Lorna spoke to the idea of working on some smaller projects to build up momentum in the community. One example would be at Robertson Park, where a new playground will be going in thanks to a partnership with Saturn.

Another possibility is a multi-court for tennis, basketball and ball hockey. There is an example of this in Crawford Estates. The cost is about $60,000. A possible site in Glenmore would be the tennis facility in Brandt’s Creek Linear Park.

Lorna also talked about the pilot project BMX Park in Crawford Estates. A five-year lease with the school district was negotiated for an unused property. The BMX club is fundraising for the park.

Terry Barton talked about land acquisition strategy for the next 10 to 15 years. He outlined the recent park planning initiatives.

Knox Mountain: expansion plans at Kathleen Lake and other properties

Blair Pond Park: off Rio in Clifton area – would be a community park with sports fields, tennis, picnic areas and trails – in the budget for 2006

Lombardy Sports Fields – playground update

Parkinson Rec Centre – possible expansion of sports fields after Dr. Knox School is relocated.

Cross Road Site – possible relocation site for Dr. Knox – 1/3 owned by City There are about 10 acres in total – could be a good opportunity for a partnership between the city and the school district similar to George Elliot School in Lake Country

Brandt’s Creek Linear Park – hope to have the final piece added in to create one long park and join them all

Glenmore Highlands – 4 or 5 neighborhood parks, 1 Community Park and 2 linear parks are planned for this area

McKinley Landing Structure plan now being drawn up

Stephen Coyote Regional Park – will have access through the Highlands

Roberts Lake Bird Sanctuary

Glenmore Sports Field – 4 baseball fields and some soccer areas

Sharon Shepard suggested that UBC-O might be building recreation facilities that could be accessed by Glenmore residents through a new access road.

It was suggested that the GVCA do a survey to find out what the top recreational needs are for the valley. Help is available on this through the planning department. Stats should be gathered from the Scouts and Guides about meeting space requirements.

It was noted that land needs to be set aside now to allow for the growth of the Glenmore area – it will probably need to be ALR land.

If the GVCA wants to initiate a partnership with the School District for the new Dr. Knox, they need to move quickly as final decisions will probably be made by summer. The contacts would be Judy Shoemaker at the school district and Terry Barton at the city, along with Jim Gabriel who is the head of Recreation Kelowna.

A comment came from the audience that the City should take some more of the initiative for the Glenmore Valley area given the tremendous growth that has been allowed here.

An audience member asked about Hartman Park on High at Mountain and how the road widening might affect that. Lorna said that hopefully there would be no impact on the park or tennis courts.

Helping Hands Restoration: May 5^th, 2005 every school child in the district will be planting 5 trees at 10 am to celebrate the centennial and to set a world record! Volunteers are needed. A number of trees will be planted in the Glenmore Valley area. Please call Lorna for details – 469-8838.

While Joe Creron, head of the Parks Department, was not able to attend the meeting, he did send a message through Terry. He said that community halls are not under the mandate of the Parks Department or have a specific budget, but if the issue is important to the residents, the City will always consider new ideas.

WE NEED TO GET ONSIDE if we want to provide our area with some needed space and good recreation sites and facilities. If you can help please email us or call one of the directors and come to a meeting.