Council is proposing to build a ‘Livvi’s Place’ playground on the site of the existing, small playground in High Street near Montefiori in heritage listed Boronia Park.  Livvi’s Place playgrounds cater for the very young and those who find it difficult to engage with many existing playgrounds.

Why would Hunters Hill Council want to destroy a serviceable, existing junior playground?  The recently agreed Boronia Park Plan of Management identified older children and young people as the priority groups needing playgrounds in Boronia Park.

Livvi’s Place playgrounds are substantial constructions and involve significantly more maintenance than usual playgrounds as they include sand pits, water play equipment, paths to be swept of leaves and sand.  A recent visit to Livvi’s Place playgrounds in Ryde and Five Dock showed equipment that had been taken out of service.

The total cost of the project would be much greater than $500,000; the report to CM4443 puts the estimated cost at $500,000 + $200,000 to reconfigure car parking, and does not estimate ongoing costs of maintenance.  Read the Trust’s submission to Council here.

3.5m road or ‘meandering trail’?

Council ‘improvements’

Does this road (left) look like  a “meandering trail with low indigenous vegetation to sides” to you?

The Boronia Park Plan of Management was developed after exhaustive research, consultation  and expense.  It clearly states that the lower part of the existing Princes Street roadway be replaced so as ‘to allow for improved pedestrian amenity and experience, reducing road width to create 3m meandering trail and low indigenous vegetation to sides and improved swale to assist with storm water sediment control’ (Section 4.5.3 Passive Recreation Management Zone, No. 3.1, p45)  Instead we have a 3.5m wide road.

Council’s work on the Looped Walking Track  (right) doesn’t meet the intentions of the Plan either.  It has produced inferior outcomes:  trip hazards and unsuitable materials that have already washed away,

The poor standard of work Council is undertaking in Boronia Park is stunning. We are concerned that the intent of the Boronia Park Plan of Management is being ignored and future work may also be inferior.  Further details of the problems and recommended solutions:  Hunters Hill Trust letter to Council re BP Plan of Management

Priority aspects of the Boronia Park Management Plan 2015 are being implemented.   See the Plan of works.  It includes

• the looped Track
• Upgrades to Princes Street Access Road
• Shelters, picnic tables and benches
• Boronia Park carpark entrance.

Send feedback to Hunters Hill Council by April 3 2017.

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It’s great to have new netball courts in Boronia Park, BUT the location is really insensitive and has a negative impact on the surrounding fields.

With a little bit of consideration and expertise it could have been handled so much better.

Boronia Park is a Schedule 5 listed Heritage Item in the Local Environment Plan (No 186).  How come Council doesn’t seem to see that changes to the park need to be really thought through?

Expert advice is readily available.

The Weekly Times published this letter from HHT’s Brigid Dowsett on January 12th, 2016

mud washes into Lane Cove River during construction of Boronia Park Oval 3

Powerful Owl (local, vulnerable species)  Image: Brad Law

“Over the many years of controversy concerning mismanagement and degradation of Boronia Park with the reconstruction of Oval 3, much debate has featured in the local press.  After a protracted 18 month process to develop a revised Plan of Management to better protect the reserve, it had looked as if a well-balanced outcome could be achieved following the selection by Hunters Hill Council of an independent consultant.  The needs of the active recreational sporting interests, as well as the legal requirement to preserve and maintain the cultural and natural values of this much loved heritage-listed Crown reserve, were well represented in the first draft Plan.

Unfortunately for the future of the natural areas of Boronia Park, its native wildlife and habitat corridors, an aggressive and persistent push by the organised sporting lobby has succeeded in having its wish list delivered by our elected Councillors.  The Plan that was adopted on 7 December will see more intensive use and access to the reserve for the dominant sports, placing increased pressure on the sensitive bushland and adjoining wetlands, already impacted by their proximity to the roadway and sporting fields.  In addition, if lighting is allowed for Oval 3 it will result in even greater pressure and disturbance.

The lengthy process of developing the Plan, and Council’s ongoing attempts at remediation following the Oval 3 debacle, have come at great expense to rate-payers.  We will continue to bear the cost of implementing the provisions within the Plan that satisfy the demands of organised sports clubs, while the budget for bush regeneration languishes.  Council has ignored the ample space available for parking along Park Rd and favoured invasive parking along the internal roadway and increased vehicle access.  This will place both pedestrians and the Park’s natural values at unnecessary risk.  The determination to construct an exclusive Clubhouse and achieve long term tenure for sporting clubs represent further alienation and disruption to shared public land.

Long necked tortoise (local) Source: Wikimedia commons

Short beaked echidna (local) Source: Wikimedia commons

Those who champion the protection of nature in our increasingly over-developed city, can surely expect better than this from our local Council?”

Angophora floribunda (local, endangered) Source: anbg.gov.au

xanthorrhoea arborea  Image: Friends of Lane Cove National Park

Despite protests from Hunters Hill Trust, Ryde & Hunters Hill Flora & Fauna Flora Preservation Society and many community members, Council has unanimously adopted the latest version of the Plan of Management for Boronia Park.  The new plan allows for:

• car parking inside the park in Princes Street
• sporting clubs to open and close the gate to Princes St
• construction of a sporting clubhouse within the park, described as a “community facility”
• lighting on Oval 3.

Source:   howwedrive.com

The changes favour selected sporting groups at the expense of:

• the ordinary users of the park
• other sporting groups that are currently excluded from Boronia park
• the environmental requirements of this bushland.

Parkland  or  carpark-land

Send your comments on the future plans for Boronia Park.  Check the post below for full details of the issues.  If you hate writing letters, you can download, sign and send our Form letter instead.

You have until 4:00pm Wednesday 16th September to speak up.

xanthorrhoea arborea (Image: friendsoflanecovenationalpark.org.au)

The Revised plan of Management for Boronia Park has many positive additions, including some suggestions we made in our original submission.  BUT some changes may damage the character of the park:

• Private vehicles in the body of the park (entering via Princes St)
• Location of a ‘Community Facility’ within the proposed amenity block between ovals 2 & 3. We believe such a facility would be best located near the Grandstand and the existing carpark, not in the body of the park.

Read the Hunters Hill Trust’s submission to Council for the full picture, including concerns about:

• Lighting Oval 3
• Exercising dogs
• Disabled access
• The need for ongoing consultation
• Protection against alienation of public access.

Of course your own personal letter is best, but if you haven’t got time to write your own, you can use our Form letter.

Comments must get to Council at Box 21 Hunters Hill 2110 or by email to vollmerj@huntershill.nsw.gov.au before 4pm Wednesday 16th September.

Council has updated the Draft Plan of Management for Boronia Park.

Check Alister Sharp’s detailed review of the How this Draft Plan compares with 2014 Draft Plan.  Important changes include:

• cars would be admitted to Princes ‘during home game days, designated organised sporting group training times and sporting/community events only, with opening and closing of the gate to be managed by council’. The existing rough carpark between Ovals 2 and 3 would be upgraded, and used for ‘maintenance/emergency/disabled parking and drop-off zone’. The upper part of the southern side of Princes St would become ‘permeable perpendicular WUSD parking bays’. [See clause 4.5.2 part 2.1 and 4.5.3 part 3.2]

• the possibility that a ‘Community Facility may be incorporated into the proposed amenity block adjacent to oval #3 if integration within/adjacent to the existing pavilion (grandstand) is not feasible’ [see clause 4.5.2 part 2.1].

There still appears to be no provision for off-leash exercise of dogs.

Download details from Council’s website here.