friends of dufferin grove park
Maintenance Issues at the Park, Spring 2004

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Park Maintenance Update, May 17, 2004

posted May 17, 2004

The good news is that since our new park supervisor Brian Green assigned Joe Eschweiler to picking litter more often than the last crew, the park is noticeably cleaner. The washroom crew, also, has done much better so far this year in keeping the field house washrooms clean. The park washrooms are now being kept open until late, for the convenience of the many soccer and basketball players and picnickers who are taking advantage of the long, long daylight hours of spring. The sandpit had its sand ploughed back in by the case loader, the big logs were replaced around the sandpit's perimeter, and a couple of picnic tables have been moved back down into the Garrison Creek hollow, so the mall staff can have their lunches there.

The bad news is that the supervisor says he has neither compost, nor fence posts, to help us with the park gardens. Nor could he get us any grass seed to overseed thin areas. It's a sad day when Parks and Rec can't come up with these basic materials! Hopefully they'll solve this problem soon.


May 2, 2004

Sand pit

posted May 2, 2004

Our new park supervisor, Brian Green, walked around the park on April 27, noting what needs attention. Two days later he brought in a backhoe and got the driver (Mark Culligan) to push a lot of sand back into the sand pit and fill in the boundary gaps with logs.

Brian Green calls in the backhoe
Mark Culligan, the driver, gets results

Up by the rink house, Mark also moved the green wood-storage sheds to their permanent places, away from Arie Kamp's morning-glory fence. Now Arie can get the ground ready to plant this year's colourful flower display.

Repair

Fence to keep out the dogs

Split rail fence repair
posted May 2, 2004

Brian has assigned Joe Eschweiler to look after the park litter and various maintenance tasks, in addition to Joe's jobs in other parks. Joe has lots of experience as a scout leader and an outdoorsman, and he is very ready to turn his hand to whatever needs doing. In the first week of may, Joe will begin to repair the farm fence around the playground.


Ross Stuart fixing our bench
Playground rain shelter

Fixed electrical outlet box
Broken benches in rainshelter
posted May 2, 2004

We asked Ross Stuart to fix some things at the park, and he did, quickly and ingeniously. In this photo he's changing the lock on the bench in the playground rain shelter. Because of poor design, the lockable bench (which also contains an electrical outlet) was often vandalized. The city's carpenters spent hours fixing the damage but since the locks were not ever really strong, soon the bench would be broken again. Ross devised a better approach and we think this one may finally solve our problems.

Ross also put new wheels on a broken food cart, built a work table at the side of the small bake oven, fixed some broken benches, and rebuilt the broken play oven in the playground. He works so fast that he would often be done by the time we thought he was just starting the next job. And his charges were very reasonable.

It's wonderful to have him solve all those long-standing problems, even if it meant paying him directly rather than putting in a city work order.

If you want to hire Ross for your house repairs, see our Trades page for a reference. You can contact him at webmaster@rossinspect.com.


Broken bench by playground:

Broken bench by playground
posted April 4, 2004

One of the best things about our park is that there's so much moveable park furniture, so people can be sociable in set-ups of their choice. However, the weather and wear-and-tear take their toll and it would be helpful if we either:

1. Got some benches and picnic tables repaired or

2. got the picnic tables and the Piper benches repaired, and ALSO located a fresh stash of cast-off locker-room benches in some city storage area (that was the source of this bench), to replace those that are in the final stages of bio-degrading.

Safety - Play Equipment

An ingenious way to cushion the bump at the slide.....

posted May 2, 2004

Brian Green says he hopes to have a harrow in the playground soon to loosen up the sand and soften any falls, and also to fill in the hollows under the swings and at the bottom of the slides (and to replace a missing rail on the climber).

Grounds

This is the main thoroughfare through the park. It is hazemac but it turns into mud and then hardens into rough bumps

posted April 4, 2004

Back in 1925 there was the first proposal (now in the city archives) to pave the park thoroughfare. It still hasn't been done even though many hundreds of people use this main thoroughfare every day. We've heard that there is no money for paving. However we've heard there is $50,000 to put an "entrance feature" into Dovercourt Park, and we've seen the "entrance feature" into Christie Pits (at the NW corner where there is nothing to enter). This is the year when there really ought to be a firm plan to put ashphalt down on the main Dufferin Park thoroughfare. That plan ought to be pretty near the top of the Division's "to-do" list.

Archives

Maintenance Issues Archives, 2004
Some of our notes from working with the city on Park Maintenance, 2004. Read more >>