To call Beacon Hill Park a “wilderness” is absurd. It was a First Nations garden before European settlers took it over.
It’s had a horse race track – Circle Drive – and many other artificial changes since then.
With the road closures to vehicles, many of the things we enjoyed as park neighbours are gone, including hearing the horses clip-clop on our street, Heywood Avenue.
At night the park is ghostly quiet. However, we still suffer from the playing field opposite, where many come by car and park in our “neighbourhood only” spaces, just so they can exercise.
The original complaint was about speeding short-cutters. That problem could have been cheaply cured with slow-down bumps at pedestrian crossings.
Take Lochside Drive in Saanich for example. It is part of the Lochside Trail and on weekends hosts a lot of cyclists, pedestrians and cars. The numerous slow-down crosswalks and speed humps spaced along this route work great.
I hope Victoria’s new city manager will bring some sanity to this mess.
Robert McInnes
Victoria