Does the City of Victoria need two splash parks 1.7 km apart, both on Douglas Street?

The “Giant Watering Can” at the children’s spray pad on Douglas Street at Beacon Hill Park is used on the hottest days of the year from June to September, weather permitting. It is in a lovely park location. It is not over-used or overcrowded by any means.

Why would the city, in a time of multiple competing priorities, plan to build another splash pad on Douglas Street? This time with the requirement to bring ruination to Centennial Square in preparation for construction. At best the City Hall location is all wet, will surely be only used seasonally, in a non-family friendly concrete square and require considerable ongoing high-cost maintenance (no doubt with all that plumbing).

Please, city councillors, prioritize cleaning up our downtown and don’t rely on a bunch of wet kids and their parents to change the culture and behaviour of our inner city.

Norman Marcy

Victoria

I’m sure that the irony of the rebar collapse of a lab under construction as part of the expansion of the University of Victoria’s Engineering Department wasn’t lost on many people. Was this a case of UVic providing a “teachable moment”?

Valerie Z. Cameron

Esquimalt

Re: “Family flies to Victoria to retrieve box they never knew they lost,” June 10.

What a delightful story to put on the front page. I admire the adventuresome spirit of Brian and Jennifer Mendieta and their children, and I hope they had a great time in Victoria. You can’t put a price on keepsakes and memories, and $4,000 was still cheaper than mailing the box to Edmonton.

Vern Miles

Victoria

Premier David Eby said we need infill to help the “missing middle” find homes.

Doesn’t that mean people who can’t afford a $1-million-plus home?

Please tell me how a $1.1-million home — part of a four-plex that is stuffed between two houses on a tiny lot — is going to help them.

The only person who benefits from this infill is the contractor.

Christina M. Truscott

Victoria

Re: “The chaos is real. America’s not coming back,” column, June 8.

I was startled to read Gene Miller’s “The chaos is real” article in........

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