A grassroots community campaign has successfully secured $200,000 in funding for a brand-new playground in Hobart, with construction now underway following 18 months of planning.
The South Hobart project was sparked by local residents who noticed a lack of local play spaces for young families.
“We moved to this area before having kids and hadn’t been thinking about playgrounds,” said petitioner Emma Green of the Cascades Playground Collective.
“When my eldest started to get mobile and we were staring to visit other playgrounds around, we realised there wasn’t anything within walking distance.”
Green and a group of neighbours rallied together and presented their petition to Hobart City Council in September 2022, with help from local kids who collected signatures door-to-door.
Lord Mayor Anna Reynolds said the playground sits between Saunders Crescent and Moree Close in South Hobart.
“Communities that are proactive and let us know what they really would like us to spend our funding on is a really welcome step forward. An active community is a community that gets things done,” she said.
Construction is expected to take six to eight weeks, with the playground set to open by mid-winter.
The new facility, built with support from the state government, will feature a picnic shelter, bike track, rock climbing wall, swings, a rocker and a climbing frame.
“We had suggestions from both parents and kids about what their ideal playground would look like,” Green said.
“Some kids had pretty lofty ideas like a flying fox from one end of the street to the other, so we toned those down.”
Designed to suit a wide age range, the playground will cater to everyone from toddlers to upper primary schoolers.
