Tennis or basketball courts, a bigger playground and a new baseball diamond are among the ideas for a corner of the Esquimalt Lions baseball park.
A house at 855 Lampson St., which the township purchased last fall, will be one of two homes to be torn down within the month, along with the former town hall.
Once the lot at the corner of Lampson Street and Colville Road is cleared and rezoned for park use, its future will likely be mapped out this fall, said Scott Hartman, Esquimalt director of parks and recreation services.
“I don’t even have a design team in place yet,” said Hartman.
Money from the township’s 2011 capital works budget has been earmarked to expand and retrofit that corner of the baseball park, possibly with multi-use courts for basketball or tennis, for example, a playground expansion, or a third baseball diamond for the Esquimalt Baseball Association, said Hartman, adding that work could begin later this year or in 2012.
The future of another home that has sat vacant since the township bought it in 2004 remains unclear.
The house at 537 Fraser St., beside the township’s teen centre and close to the Esquimalt Recreation Centre, was purchased as part of an expansion plan for recreation programs and the recreation centre, Hartman said.
The house will also soon be torn down, and the lot rezoned, but what it will be used for is not known, said Hartman, adding that the township didn’t set aside money in the 2011 budget to develop the site.
emccracken@vicnews.com