Hamilton wants to build more parks downtown, here's how they plan to make that happen

Charlotte Burke says she and her young family didn't realize how lucky they were to live close to parks until they moved to Hamilton.

After coming from Toronto to house hunt, they "fell in love" with the east-end home they now live in. Burke says they drove by Gage Park and from the car, it seemed a lot closer than it is on foot.

A runner and dog walker, Burke says she can walk to the park from home in about 15 minutes. But it's "a bit of a rigamarole" to get to a park her four-year-old daughter can enjoy. "Walking to Gage Park, she just is too tired. It would take us a really long time," she said. "I'd love to just have some place that we could go that would be two minutes from our home, and be able to go for a walk there after dinner quickly."

Burke and her neighbours may be in luck because the city has officially recognized a need for more parks in the lower city. Now, the city is working out how to get the land to create more.

In its first-ever parks master plan, which councillors approved in October, staff outlined strategies to acquire more park land — specifically in the core. The city is currently under its per-person target for park land, and as the population grows, staff say meeting the target could become more of a challenge. 

Cynthia Graham, Hamilton's director of environmental services, and John Vandriel a senior project manager with the city, say the goal is to have a shared "long-term vision" for Hamilton's parks systems. They also note making such a plan is required by the province.

In the context of the master plan, park land refers to lands municipally designated for public use as parks which people may use for recreation, and excludes spaces such as cemeteries,

Hamilton has four classes of park: city-wide, which serve all residents like Battlefield Park, large community parks, which serve around 20,000 people like Gage Park, mid-size neighbourhood parks, which serve around 5,000 people, and small parkettes, which serve fewer than 5,000 people. 

The master plan has a focus on neighbourhood parks specifically. Hamilton has 1,155 hectares of municipal parkland (1.98 hectares per 1,000 people) and 298 hectares of neighbourhood parkland (0.51 hectares per 1,000 people).

Per the official plan, the goal is to get the rate of municipal parkland to 2.1 hectares per 1,000 people, or 21 square metres per person. Another goal is to increase the amount of neighbourhood parkland to 0.7 hectares per 1,000 people, or seven square metres per person. 

So, how does a city create new parks in an already built up downtown?

Presenting to councillors, city staff outlined several methods, including buying land, forming agreements that let other owners' lands be used as parks, expropriating land and repurposing land, like with John Rebecca Park, which used to be a parking lot.

Graham says repurposing is tricky work, involving improving soil quality by bringing in clean fill, and developing land so it's suitable for recreation. That development brings cost in addition to the cost of acquiring land itself.

Martha Barnes, a professor in Brock University's Department of Recreation and Leisure Studies, said creating a parks plan that is separate from a city's master plan pays tribute to the important role parks play in communities. That role, she says, extends beyond sports and recreation. 

"A vibrant community park can have suppers in the park and community groups meeting," Barnes said. "Parks can really take on what the community wants it to be about."

And proximity, she said, is especially important. "The idea of having to get in a car and drive to a park is really not what planners want," she said. Having parks that are walkable means older children can go solo, and includes people who don't or can't drive. "To benefit from frequent park use, you have to be close to it." 

Barnes added that early in the pandemic, when outdoor activities were far safer than indoor, it became clear that "park access was not equal," with lower income earners having relatively fewer opportunities to exercise than those earning higher incomes. In particular, she said, people in denser urban areas need better access.

"[Parks] really matter in quality of living for the residents of our city. They matter in health and greater health outcomes. They matter in our social life," Vandriel said. "We're working towards making this community a better place to live."