Armidale Mayor Simon Murray welcomed $999,700 funding from the NSW State Government on Monday morning for what he described as a super-playground.
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Member for Northern Tablelands Adam Marshall said the funding for the adventure playground would provide Armidale with another tourist attraction.
Armidale’s adventure playground will be built next to Hungry Jacks in Dumaresq Street, be fully fenced and contain enough “stuff” to keep children occupied for a long time; although just what will be in it has yet to be decided.
“There is going to be so many different things in it,” said Cr Murray.
“[But] we haven’t gone to that level yet. We’ve just talked about what we want.
“When we went out for the Stronger Communities Fund, we were looking for what projects - and the community ranked this one as one of the highest ones. So, the community is striving for this as well.”
The playground will be built away from Dumaresq Creek for a number of reasons, occasional flooding and regular monthly markets spring readily to mind, but the accidental drowning of a three-year-old girl in the creek in 2016 quite obviously remained in the back of everyone’s mind at this morning’s official announcement.
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So, was the playground being constructed in the right place?
“We are going to have to work through it, because there are obviously safety issues in both domains,” Cr Murray said as he pointed.
“You’ve got the street there, where it’s proposed to be close to, and if we bring it close to the creek, there, we’d have the creek close beside it and the water issues.
“So, where do you put it? You have to put it somewhere, the Tamworth playground is right beside a street. Is there an issue there provided the parents are mindful and look after the kids?”
Member for Northern Tablelands Adam Marshall thought the children’s adventure playground would be brilliant.
“It’s centrally located in town, the idea being that there is plenty of car parking, the youngsters can be in the playground and the parents or one of the parents are very close to coffee shops and the CBD,” he said.
“It provides just another reason for the thousands of people that travel past Armidale on the New England Highway each day, to turn at the roundabouts and come into the city.”
