LOCAL residents say they are disappointed that Great Lakes Council hasn’t upgraded the Lion’s Club Park at Blueys Beach despite road works near the park completed well over a year ago.
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Resident and business owner Tom Evans raised his concerns with the Great Lakes Advocate in October last year after the park was left unchanged three months after road works along Boomerang Drive were completed.
As part of the works, the roadway was raised up which meant the park was no longer road level and sloped down making access to it unsafe.
Council’s operations manager Robert Fish told the Advocate last year that a new set of stairs would be constructed to provide access to the park and a load of mulch would also be laid on existing top soil.
Since then, council has constructed a set of concrete stairs with hand rails at the park but Mr Evans said the stairs have been placed in an odd position and don’t provide any wheelchair access.
He said as far as he knows no mulch was laid on the top soil and the park has remained “an uninviting place to sit” for both locals and tourists.
“It’s just been left. It’s the only picnic area in Blueys and it used to be used quite a lot,” he said.
“But not now. It hardly gets used at all. Why would anyone want to sit there? It’s over grown and is in need of landscaping.”
Judy Donnelly who works at the Tourist Information Centre in Blueys said the park is an eyesore that needs to be addressed.
“Why they put those concrete stairs in is beyond me. It still doesn’t make anyone want to go down there,” Ms Donnelly said.
“Blueys is quite an iconic place that attracts a lot of tourists. If the beach is too windy I often get asked ‘Is there somewhere to go for a picnic’? At the moment this is our best offer which isn’t great. It’s quite embarrassing actually.
“Surely council can do something. It needs beautifying or if they can’t afford to do anything then they should take the chairs and tables away and make use of them somewhere else.”
Council’s manager of parks and recreation Andrew Staniland said because of limited public space in the area council has decided to leave the park as is.
“Since the road upgrade was completed, council has been investigating the best option for the location of public seating in the Blueys shops locality,” he said.
“There is limited suitable public space available in this area. This site in particular is very small so we have decided to leave the park as is and will be encouraging grass coverage at the park.
“However if we get an opportunity to install seating at a suitable location in Blueys then we will certainly look into that.”