Adelaide City Council approves spending money to fix safety hazards at Quentin Kenihan memorial playground

The City Council will spend half a million fixing a litany of problems at the Rymill Park playground named for Quentin Kenihan.

Adelaide City Council has allocated $500,000 to fix flaws with a playground dedicated to a disability advocate.

Elected members have approved spending the money to remove safety hazards and improve wheelchair access to the Quentin Kenihan Inclusive Playspace, at Rymill Park.

The problems were highlighted by the family of Mr Kenihan following the premature official opening of the playground late last year.

They were made public last week by Cr Phillip Martin, who unsuccessfully sought on Tuesday night to have the council’s handling of the $1.3m project investigated by the Auditor-General’s Office.

Elected members have approved spending the money to remove safety hazards and improve wheelchair access to the Quentin Kenihan Inclusive Playspace, at Rymill Park. Picture: Tricia Watkinson

“We have been called lots of names, from numpties to something worthy of a script from a Monty Python movie,” he said. “We should provide some confidence to the state that it can have some confidence in dealing with the City of Adelaide and we will admit our mistakes.”

Cr Mary Couros said the publicity about the playground – generated by Cr Martin – had “devastated” Mr Kenihan’s family. “This is actually completely against what Quentin’s family wanted,” she said.

“I have worked closely with the family since January regarding the issues highlighted by children using the playground. We are working with the family to rectify the issues.”

Cr Martin said at least 10 problems had since been identified at the playground, including trip hazards, wrong gate latches, a dangerous rubber track, inadequate signage and insufficient disabled parking. Picture: Tricia Watkinson

Cr Couros said the playground was opened early because a $1m funding agree­ment with the State Gov­ernment dictated it had to be operational by December.

The playground had no disabled toilets at the time as a modular facility was stuck in Melbourne by COVID-19, while other work, such as paths, was still to be finished.

“It was not perfect when we had open it for the funding deed in December, but that was the agreement,” Cr Couros said.

Cr Martin said at least 10 problems had since been identified at the playground, including trip hazards, wrong gate latches, a dangerous rubber track, inadequate signage and insufficient disabled parking.

“Whatever the cost, this needs to be finished to the standard to make it a fitting memorial,” he said.

“If being a whistleblower is an offence, then I plead guilty. I have no problem letting the world know when the council stuffs up. And we stuffed up.”

Cr Alexander Hyde said the playground was “no orphan” when it came to projects causing problems for the council.