Woollahra Council will try get skate park built at Centennial Park instead after scrapping plan to build it at Rushcutters Bay

Local children were left bitterly disappointed on Monday night when Woollahra Council axed its controversial plan to build a skate park and basketball court at Rushcutters Bay Park

Matt and Alex Higgins-Titsha and Rory Doyle were bitterly disappointed after Woollahra Council scrapped its plan to build a skate park and basketball court at Rushcutters Bay Park. Pic: Danny Aarons

LOCAL children were left bitterly disappointed on Monday night when Woollahra Council axed its controversial plan to build a skate park and basketball court at Rushcutters Bay Park.

It comes after Sydney Federal Labor MP Tanya Plibersek yesterday wrote an eleventh-hour letter in support of the proposal, putting her on a collision course with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull who had opposed it.

Children sat on the floor and parents lined the walls of the council’s public gallery, which had not been that full for several years.

All councillors except Anthony Marano backed a proposal by Cr Katherine O’Regan to immediately start discussions with the Centennial Park Trust to see if the facility could instead be built near the reservoir on the Woollahra side of Centennial Park facing Oxford St.

Jasper Oxley, 10, presented a petition to the meeting in support of the skate park. Cr Andrew Petrie tabled three petitions in opposition. Picture: John Appleyard

Last week a spokeswoman for the Parklands told the Wentworth Courier a skate park had been included in a masterplan for the park, but that there were “no immediate plans” to build a skate park near the reservoir.

But Cr O’Regan said Parklands chief Kim Ellis had told her he was “happy to have conversations” with the council.

“It’s a better location because it is not so close to residents,” Cr O’Regan said.

Cr Marano said local children would have to wait another 20 years if its built in Centennial Park because the masterplan outlines a bluprinte for the park up until 2040.

Michelle and Peter Bowers with dog Jake, Teresa Kiernan and Leonie Elder were worried the youth facility would erode space used for public recreation. Picture: John Appleyard

Cr Marano’s proposal to defer the matter to allow an independent assessment and an investigation into potential to build the facility at Lyne Park at Rose Bay, was defeated.

Matt Higgins-Titsha said a skate park at Centennial Park was not what they had spent many years campaigning for.

“Why did they tell us yes for six years just to say no,” he said.

“The whole point of doing it was to have something in our area.

Matt and Alex Higgins-Titsha are pictured here in 2013—the boys have campaigned for several years to get the facility.

Darling Point Society president Charlotte Feldman was happy with the decision.

“I’m a bit disappointed for the kids but if it can be done in Centennial Park then that’s a good compromise because everyone I have spoken to in the park is opposed to it,” she said.

“The kids can get there by not travelling to far.

“We need a youth facility but that wasn’t the right location.”

Cr Andrew Petrie said residents had already objected to a skate park being built at Lyne Park several years ago.

“And Rushcutters Bay is already one of the most overused parks in the municipality.”