THE FIXER City jumps to defence of children at parkette
A collapsed section of fence separating a junkyard from a small city park was bristling with rusty nails laying in wait for a child’s foot, until the parks department found out. The Coxwell Ave. Parkette is on the west side of Coxwell, north of Gerrard St. E. Its almost-new jungle gym and swing set makes it popular with local kids.
To the north and west of the park is a fenced-in property, once a coal yard but now a junkyard. It is covered with old freight trailers that have the back doors open and are filled with an assortment of junk.
Junkyards have always been a magnet for adventurous kids. And until yesterday, this one was wide open to any child who wanted to explore it. The old wooden fence between the junkyard and the park is crumbling in places, with a large section at the back completely collapsed. To get into the junkyard, kids needed only to walk over the fence on the ground. The fence was bristling with long, rusty nails pointing skyward, just the sort of things that a child might not notice. Tom Garel called us about it, saying he was worried that a child would be seriously hurt.
STATUS: We called Sandy Straw, who’s in charge of parks in that area, on Monday. She agreed the rusty nails required immediate attention. Within an hour, parks workers had removed the collapsed fence. Yesterday, a temporary plastic fence went up between the park and the junkyard. Straw said the city will issue an order requiring the owner to put up a new fence.
WHO GOT IT FIXED: Workers under the direction of Straw, parks and recreation manager, south district, east area; 416392- 1909; sstraw@toronto.ca