I see it used maybe a third of evenings for baseball and rarely see pedestrian usage of it. You have a fair point about per capita parkland. I think the disagreements we have comes down to what types of sacrifice I'm okay with. Less parkland is okay with me if it means this much housing. I would like the balance of maybe closer and better access to Taylor Creek off of the north end of eastdale considering all the density around there and the fact that it's 10ish minutes walk from this development. That would be a balance I would be perfectly okay with.
My principle issue in terms of park size is functionality.
For instance, to have a soccer pitch (and the City overall has a lot of wait lists for these) you require about 1ha or 2.5 acres for the field itself, but assuming this requires some buffer, more like 1.4ha or 3 acres. That assumes no playground or children's waterplay etc.
I think the City frankly has too many parks, but not enough parkland.
In terms of manicured parks, (as opposed to ravines/nature) I would really like to see a 1.4ha minimum size, which provides some programming options, and I would prefer 2ha/5ac so that you can do at least 2 different things within the space. (or one really well).
If one wants nature, I would measure appropriate size in a couple of ways, from a selfish, human perspective, how many people/hikers/cyclists does a space reasonably allow w/o crowding, and from an ecological perspective you're looking for benchmarks around health, biodiversity, ability to have self-sustaining quality habitats for plants and wildlife.
In general, this requires some very large areas, including areas either off-limits to humans or with low accessibility to we don't trample rare plants or harass human-adverse wildlife.
I'm perfectly supportive of development and housing, but I want to see both parks and other services (transit, childcare, schools, libraries, recreation centres etc. properly planned for).
Rec. Centres are a great example of quality/quantity issues in this particular area..
On paper, you have a Main Square Rec Centre and Secord Community Centre not far away.
In reality, neither one has a gym. Main Square is a pool, plus a small fitness room meant to handle yoga/dance/weights combined. Secord doesn't have the pool. Nearby school D.A. Morrison has a pool, but its only open to the community one even evening and Saturday daytime each week.
So 3 facilities, no gym, and if you add Stan Wadlow's clubhouse, still no gym.
I would prefer to see 2 facilities to the current 4, but have them offer gyms, running tracks, a good pools, etc etc.
As it stands the proposal at 2575 (Main Square) seeks to demolish the existing facility there and not replace it, instead contributing 4M to a future replacement, on a site the City has yet to identify, at a probable cost exceeding 80M.
So we're actually going to reduce recreation service here in the near to medium term.
to be fair I'm definitely more neutral on this topic as I did not know about the development pipeline that is probably going to come to shoppers world and the plaza across from kfc
