Kingston almost half-way to city-wide accessibility overhaul
For the past decade, the City of Kingston has been busy undertaking a city-wide overhaul of its existing community buildings and sports pavilions, to ensure they are accessible to everyone.
These accessibility upgrades aim to ensure that all of our community buildings can be accessed by people of all abilities along with improvements to support female access to sports facilities.
Kingston Mayor Steve Staikos said that we still have a long way to go, but we’re proud to be making headway to help close the gap and make Kingston a city that provides equal opportunities for everyone.
“Although every new Council project meets Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) accessibility standards, we have been working to upgrade existing infrastructure across the city. This is a huge task that will cost tens of millions of dollars to achieve – and we are almost halfway there,” Cr Staikos said.
“We are currently on track to meeting our goal of achieving full accessibility compliance across all of our public buildings by 2035.”
A city-wide audit presented to Council in September 2021 showed that 42 percent of council’s public buildings now provide DDA-compliant toilet facilities, with an additional 11 percent at varying stages of renewal (actively planning for renewal or currently under construction).
“Kingston has also achieved a similar level of Female Friendly amenities within sport and recreation facilities. There are now 42 percent meeting accessibility requirements, with an additional 12 projects actively progressing towards renewal.
“To date, the majority of the female-friendly facility upgrades Council has undertaken, have been connected to AFLW, cricket, netball and soccer clubs. However, there are plans to provide these female-friendly upgrades across all codes of sport.”
Kingston is home to 63 sporting pavilions which support community sport participation.
“Of these 63, we have 51 that have current active participation by females. The remaining 12 pavilions currently have no female participation, with officers presently working with these clubs to encourage and develop female participation levels.”
Council has also been investing millions of dollars (and advocating to the state government) to create fully-accessible ‘Changing Places’ toileting facilities across Kingston. These are now located at Riding for the Disabled, Moorabbin, the public promenade space in Carrum and within Bicentennial Park, with works for additional Changing Places facilities underway at the Mentone Life Saving Club and Peter Scullin Reserve.
“We are absolutely committed to making Kingston an inclusive city that provides fun activities for all of its community members. We have ensured that Bicentennial Park playground features an accessible Liberty Swing and are working on a masterplan for an accessible playground and beach access at Peter Scullin Reserve in Mordialloc.”
