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Details
Parks
Historically the CWK has not considered the acquisition of parks as a high priority. There are many reasons for this including the relative youth of the city. Also, we have been blessed with a relatively large number of regional parks and open land. Much of this land is quite rugged but functions reasonably well as “Passive Parks” for hiking, dog walking, etc.
The main issue is the relative lack of Active Parks. These are generally smaller parks that can be used as play areas and sports fields. This lack of active parks is a result of most of the flatter land being taken up by older developments that lacked park planning or by Agricultural Land Reserve.
It turns out that our community fares especially badly with respect to active parks (see Fig #1 & Fig #2) Recall that LHCA comprises the city-designated areas of Lakeview Heights and S. Boucherie. Without bold action our situation will only get worse as the population increases, infill housing continues, and our demographics move towards younger families.
Fig #1 Lakeview and S. Boucherie are lacking in active parks
Fig #2 A comparison of the Lakeview Community and Kelowna at the same scale. Note the big blank area in the middle of our community.
In conclusion we recommend that the CWK acquire at least 4 blocks of flat land of 0.7 hectares or more per parcel inside LHC for Active Parks. They should be distributed in such a way that they can serve the maximum number of residents with the minimum walking distance. This may require extra funding and/or innovative approaches with the ALR.