Kids Know Their Schoolyard Best

2009 Image of Hollycrest MS. Over 12 acres of the property may be considered for sale. Copyright 2012, Google.

Edit: The School Board has decided today (Nov 22/2012) to not sever any land from schools.

A recent report from the Toronto Star indicated that the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) is mulling over a decision to sell portions of about 367 acres of school parkland to pay for renovation and addition costs.The discussion that will follow this report will no doubt spark a flurry of angry parents looking to make sure that their kids don't lose their space to play. You can be certain that adults from the community, school board, and city will be wrestling with each other to figure out where and how much.

But let's call a spade a spade: this land is not "community" land in the sense that a public park is. It's owned by the TDSB, and they have the right to do with it as they wish (within reason). Yes, it's meant for kids to play in, but they're not places to walk your dog in, or to go play a game of pick-up soccer with your friends (unless you and your friends are kids). If you want it to be an actual city park (i.e. public property), then residents can try and petition the city to take the land.There are parts of the city that are recognized as having a deficit of parkland, and it therefore might make sense to have the city purchase it (if they've got the money to do so), or to seek it as a section 37 benefit from developer.

But here's a good question: what do the kids think about selling some of their playground? I remember being a kid with ample space to run around in, and in my somewhat hazy memory, I also remember that we had more than enough space to run around and play soccer (or what things got really crazy, soccer-baseball) where I grew up in Nova Scotia.

And if I'm being honest, our schools often had too much space. Even as kids, you end up using your space in a very practical way. At one of our former elementary schools ("Colby", now demolished), there was a large field that was often unused because it was flat and slightly downhill from the rest of the field, leaving it a wet mess for most of the year. It's one real use was to see it converted into a skating rink for a short period of the year, which was fun but I'm not sure justified leaving it as a big wet empty field for 11 months of the year.

So I think if you were to ask the kids who go to these schools, you could probably get a pretty good idea of not only how much space they do use, but also what they use space for (which is an important thing to know!). They'd likely be able to paint a very clear picture of what is/is not needed, and from there you could really begin to figure out which parts are suitable to be sold to developers (likely for infill housing). If it's about the kids, then we should make sure to include them in the conversation.