Kitchener to spend $150K for Rockway Gardens repairs
KITCHENER — Kitchener will be spending $150,000 over the next three years to carry out needed repairs and maintenance at Rockway Gardens.
The gardens, a popular spot for wedding photographs with its many flower beds, rockery, lily ponds and fountains, have never had a provision in the city’s budget for repairs and maintenance, said Denise McGoldrick, Kitchener’s director of operations, environmental services.
But they’re an important city asset that the community cherishes, and it makes sense to invest money to ensure the gardens’ infrastructure remains in good repair, she said.
“Rockway really is that cultural icon,” she said. “It’s beautiful. It’s impressive. It’s a place where the community goes for inspiration. It’s a place of pride.”
In an unusual arrangement, the city owns the 2.8 hectares that make up the garden, but the Kitchener Horticultural Society manages the gardens and operates them, largely with the help of volunteers and a yearly city grant, which was $232,000 in 2017.
The horticultural society has installed new features such as the fountains, gazebo and footbridge through private donations, and the city has stepped in occasionally to pay for pressing repairs such as failing fences.
“The infrastructure is aging,” McGoldrick said. Top priorities are the gardens’ irrigation system and repair and maintenance of the rockery, was built as a make-work project in the 1930s, with 2,000 tons of rock transported by train from Rockton, southeast of Cambridge.
The rockery and the Rockway Golf Course next door to the gardens were major make-work projects for people thrown out of work during the Great Depression. Unemployed homeowners in the city also worked there to pay off back taxes and prevent having their houses seized by the city.
The city will spend $50,000 a year for the next three years, and after that $10,000 a year will be set aside to build up a fund for future repairs to infrastructure such as the gardens’ walkways.