Parents and babysitters in Saint John will want to make note of this: there are seven playgrounds proposed to for decommissioning under the city’s strategic plan for parks and recreation, Play SJ.
According to a presentation delivered to Common Council there are currently 65 playgrounds however the total required is actually much less than that at 14.
Saint John Mayor Mel Norton tells us the overall philosophy of Play SJ is to development quality recreation infrastructure over quantity of recreation infrastructure. He points to the city’s population declining over the years saying that at one point in time there were about 20,000 or more people and so there were simply more recreation facilities.
Norton says this is an exercise in identifying those recreation facilities that are no longer used or much less used than they were before.
Six playgrounds in Saint John were decommissioned last year.
