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Plans for a splash park gets underway

Four people came together on Aug. 23 evening at Globe International Cuisine to discuss the idea of building a splash park.
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Four people meet at the Globe International Cuisine restaurant on Aug. 23 to discuss the prospect of building a splash park in Hope. (X. Y. Zeng photo)

Four people came together on Aug. 23 evening at Globe International Cuisine to discuss the idea of building a splash park.

Ideas, costs from a previous proposal almost 10 years ago, locations, fundraising targets all came together with the help of Coun. Scott Medlock, who attended to guide the discussion. Spokesperson Cathy Hirst also attended and spoke to The Standard.

“What it would do is it would generate a lot of interest from the community as far as young people and kids and their parents in terms of something new to do in the summer, something that’s free,” said Hirst. “Hopefully generate some interest from tourists as well, some activity within the downtown core.

“There’s nothing quite like kids and parents and laughter and water.”

The group named Memorial Park, the Hope and District Recreation Centre’s compound and C. E. Barry Intermediate School’s former grounds as potential locations. Memorial Park gained the most traction — Hirst explained that the park is downtown, has plenty of parking and has a playground in it. The park also has water service and washrooms.

“It’s almost a natural evolution to have something like this in Memorial Park,” said Hirst.

Hirst also explained that C. E. Barry would pose a challenge to access while the rec centre is a bit far to capitalize on downtown traffic.

Medlock provided documents of the previous splash park plan, which has costs and a design to it. Hirst said the costs are out of date and needs updating. Also, certain decisions on the design of the splash park can affect its costs, for example, if they want to recycle the water, they need a filtration system. Costs can also be lowered depending on how much the community donates or volunteers in the project.

The next steps for the splash park group involves an October meeting where members would have gathered more information, such as costs and fundraising initiatives that they can implement over the next six to eight months, Hirst said.

“It’s not a short-term thing, it’s certainly something that is going to take a fair amount of development and then bringing in council and presenting to council and looking for approval,” said Hirst.

Hirst encourages more people to attend the next meeting to contribute ideas and thoughts. They can be found on Facebook under the name “Splash Park For Hope BC.”