Major upgrades have now been completed at Alsatia Park, with the community already taking advantage of the improvements.
Following extensive community consultation, new play equipment, barbeque facilities and football posts have been installed.
The redesigned park also ensures greater separation of the younger children's playground and the skatepark as highly requested by the community.
Mackay Mayor Greg Williamson said a lot of work had been done to ensure the park caters to a range of age groups.
“The new and improved Alsatia Park includes two themed play units – a small tractor for younger children and a large harvester for older children, which really tie in with the history of the area,” Mayor Williamson said.
“We’ve listened to community feedback about facilities at the park and have included new toilet amenities and an improved barbeque area.”
As part of the large-scale project, extra care was taken to ensure a lasting legacy for a young skateboarder, who championed the original design, continued to be a part of the park.
The bronze memorial plaque for Luke Payne has now been inlaid to the skate park.
“Luke was just shy of his 18th birthday when he died in a crash in 2004. He was a passionate skateboarder and had started designing the kind of facility he would like to have seen developed in Walkerston,” Luke’s sister-in-law, Kirsty Payne said.
“The park has always been somewhere our family has gone to remember Luke and when our kids were younger, it was nice to be able to have a picnic at ‘Uncle Luke’s Park’, instead of taking them to a cemetery.”
As well as playground equipment, Alsatia Park features a ping pong table, which will have custom designed artwork by local artist, Muddy Grimes.
Muddy, who is a full-time tattoo artist, has worked with local groups like Crossroad Arts and contributed to large murals in the city heart, including the CQ Rescue painting near Wood Street.
“I’m really looking forward to my first ping pong table and it’s been great to get ideas from young people in the Valley about how they’d like the artwork to look,” Muddy said.
“They’ve already got some strong themes around the work being bright and bold and include images of bats and turtles – things that are really iconic to the area.
“Hopefully it will be something that really draws people to the park and maybe even inspires young people to pursue a career in creative art.”
An official opening of Alsatia Park will be held in mid-November.
The recently re-opened Alsatia Park has already proven popular with locals and visitors. Photo supplied
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