Tuesday, 14 January 2025

Demolition brings new park a step closer

The demolition of the Subiaco Community Centre commenced yesterday to make way for a future pocket park.

The lemon-scented gum tree on the site, which was added to the City’s Significant Tree Register in 2023, will be preserved throughout the demolition of the old centre and the new park’s development.

The centre was built in 1967 as the Senior Citizen Centre and provided a range of health and aged care services, including meals on wheels, for fifty years. Most of these centres across Australia closed as aged care became increasingly complex and are now operated by expert private and not-for-profit agencies.

The centre was also home to the Subiaco RSL, until the merger with the Shenton Park RSL relocated the combined RSL to the Shenton Park Community Centre.

The design of the future pocket park will be informed by community consultation which was untaken in December 2024.

Consultation found the community wants a quiet space with shade, natural vegetation and seating.

Once the building has been demolished, the site will be mulched to ensure it remains tidy whilst plans for the pocket park design are underway.

Mayor David McMullen said the March 2024 Council decision to create a new pocket park was made with community front of mind.

"An additional park in the centre of Subiaco will offer environmental benefits and contribute towards community wellbeing," he said.

"In the centre of an established inner-city area like ours, the opportunity to build a new park from scratch does not come up often. We are looking forward to saying goodbye to the existing dilapidated building, and seeing the new park – with its design based on the community input – take shape."

The pocket park complements other recent public realm upgrades by the City, including Seddon Street, Forrest Walk and Postal Walk.
 

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