THUNDER BAY – The off leash park the city’s dog owners have been waiting for is officially opened.
Flanked by half a dozen local pooches and their owners, at-large Coun. Rebecca Johnson cut the ribbon at the entrance of the Centennial Park off-leash dog area Tuesday. The new park is the fourth, and likely final, off-leash park in Thunder Bay.
The Centennial location features a 0.6-kilometre loop completely surrounded by natural habitat. That’s unique from the other three dog parks, which are either enclosed by fences or at least partly borderer by unnatural habitat and roadways.
“This is the park we’ve been waiting for this whole time, the one that we’ve been begging for,” said Kathy Learning, dog owner and member of the committee that has helped lobby for the dog parks. “I think it’s so great that we have this now.”
The area entrance is marked by new signage right beside Centennial Park’s main parking lot. City crews widened the trails and cleaned up some of the brush to make the loop ideal for an off-leash setting.
“It’s just a walk in the forest,” Johnson added. “If you were looking for an ideal off-leash dog park than this would be the one that you would go to.”
Tuesday’s park opening marked the city will not pursue the creation of more off-leash parks.
Johnson said the committee lobbying for the parks believe that four off-leash parks is suitable to the city’s population.
So instead of identifying new parks, Johnson said the focus will be on improving the current off-leash locations.
“We need to improve what we already have,” she said, adding that some parks could use more benches while the fenced in areas may benefit from added trees.
The first off-leash park opened in Thunder Bay on an area just north of Central Avenue in 2007 following a year of lobbying efforts.
By 2009 thee city opened its second off-leash area near the Port Arthur Stadium before opening its third location in Westfort.
More information about the city’s off-leash parks can be found online here.
