The City of Prince George heard from several hundred residents this spring during its outreach campaign gathering input on the city’s parks.
Prince George is struggling to maintain many of it’s parks, and may sell some off in neighbourhoods with a surplus of green space to regain a balance and improve services to other parks.
But first, the City needs a formal park plan, and after consultations this spring, there is plenty of feedback to sift through.
Community Outreach Coordinator Robyn McConkey says 66% of people agreed with the City’s potential parks priorities, while 80% agreed the city needs to improve its parks.
“In some areas there was strong agreement on different neighbourhoods, whether it be maintenance issues or infrastructure or programming in the park and then in other areas people were saying; ‘you know what no we like our neighbourhood this way.’”
As for the other 1 in 3 respondents that didn’t agree with the City’s potential plans, McConkey says they will be taking them into account while developing its draft plan this summer. The draft will be ready for the public in October, when more public input will be collected during ‘Talktober’ neighbourhood conversations.
“A lot of the feedback was the importance of riverfront park and trails to Prince George citizens… another major theme was a connect citywide trail system. People really like those connectivities and getting active through trails like biking or walking.” McConkey added
The final park strategy will go to Council in early 2017.
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