Orange City Council has taken its first steps towards re-opening outdoor council venues.
All council-run playgrounds, including the skate parks, adventure playground and outdoor exercise equipment, have re-opened today (Friday) and the outdoor pool at the Aquatic Centre will re-open on Monday morning.
Orange Mayor Reg Kidd is delighted by today's news that council facilities will re-open.
"We've all got a long road ahead of us as we try to come back from this community health crisis, and while we all need to work hard to stay as safe as we can, it's great to be taking the first few steps forward," Cr Reg Kidd said.
"Our local playgrounds are a great venue for that daily walk and some activity with the family and I'm sure people will be sensible as they start to use them again."
Orange City Council CEO David Waddell said the council was continuing to follow the recommendations of government and health authorities.
"I'm pleased to see the first of the council outdoor venues re-opening, but it's up to every parent and carer to think through what's involved in going to one of our playgrounds," David Waddell said.
"We have playground equipment in more than thirty community neighbourhood parks, as well outdoor gym equipment and the three skate parks. Our staff are simply not able to sanitise this equipment after every person uses it. It's up to parents and carers to think it through, and then take steps such as wiping equipment down before they use it.
Outdoor pool to open Monday
The 50m outdoor pool will open from 7am Monday but bookings are essential (6363 3000). Only two one-hour time-slots can be booked at any one time to ensure the pool is open to as many people as possible. Time-slots are on the hour (eg 7am, 8 am, 9 am). People with a booking will have to wait outside the aquatic centre until their time-slot.
"When the outdoor 50 metre pool opens on Monday it will have to comply with the government's requirements for social distancing and limits of 10 people at a time in the pool at a time," David Waddell said. "To avoid long queues of people waiting for their turn at doing laps, that means booking a time-slot".
"This re-opening is not intended for recreational use but for exercise which can include aqua-aerobics, walking or swimming.
"We'll be doing our best to make this work at the outdoor pool, but we'll be monitoring the social distancing closely and if the guidelines are not being met, we will have to review the re-opening."
The pool has been reconfigured with 9 lanes, each 2.5 metres wide. One of the lanes has been divided into two 25 metres sections.
The pool will be open 6 days week from 7am to 5pm. Mondays to Saturday.
The change rooms and toilets are open. Showers are not available.
Entry is with tap-and-go cards only. Admission charge is $7 for adults and $5 concession. Once the COVID-19 crisis has passed all season tickets will be extended. Season tickets cannot be used at this time.
Because of the need for bookings, the pool won't be open this weekend , but bookings can be made over the phone
The water temperature is 26 degrees.
