Hello Oakville Curling Club members.
I hope all of you are thoroughly enjoying the curling season. In the coming weeks you will see work beginning at the club on a number of projects that we hope to have completed by the end of July. There may be some slight inconvenience as a result but we will be working to minimize this as best we can.
Accessibility
As you may know, we received a $200,000 grant from the Ontario Trillium Fund to assist in bringing the Oakville Curling Club into compliance with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act. It's a law that was passed in 2005 to improve accessibility for people with disabilities in Ontario. The work will include new emergency signage throughout the club, renovations to the lounge bathroom, removable ice access ramps, new automatic doors, a lift for wheelchair access from the ice level to the lounge and removing and replacing the north sidewalk which will be elevated to meet the grade of the rink and abut the building for wheelchair access. This will be done in conjunction with resolving the drainage issues we have had on the northside of the ice shed.
Northside Drainage
When the north sidewalk is removed we have hired an engineering firm and a general contractor to excavate the length of the ice shed and run a french drain that will divert the roof drainage to a new cistern located under what will be a new west side paved parking lot. This will eliminate and flooding/icing on the new sidewalk.
West Side Parking Lot
We have been working with the Town of Oakville on a repaving solution on the west side parking lot (Reynolds Street). Timing on this is TBD but we are hopeful that this can be completed before the beginning of the 2025/2026 season. This is dependant on a number of factors including the Towns plan to renovate and upgrade the Wallace Park Tennis courts. We are also investigating new light standards for the parking lot provide an upgraded safety/security component. This part of the project will be in place before the final grading of the parking lot.
I’d like to thank the Accessibility Committee and the Finance Committee for their continued efforts on these projects. A special thank you goes out to Karl Mitchell who has been very generous with his time and expertise which has been critical in moving these projects forward.
We will keep you posted on any new developments. In the meantime, enjoy the rest of the season and good luck to all in the playoffs.
Greg Irwin
