20 January 2017

My Summer: Vanessa Jones

| Vanessa Jones
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Kippax Library. Photo: Libraries ACT

West Belconnen resident and independent candidate for Ginninderra at last year’s ACT election decided to put together a My Summer that better reflected the lives of people who live in the outer suburbs, because while Manuka Pool has been a popular inclusion in the series, it’s not so convenient for those who live beyond the inner suburbs.

This summer I’m most looking forward to … Just being healthy and looking after my home and garden. Hopefully we will get to “the coast”, when it quietens down a bit. The Sapphire Coast is the best area, I think. Tathra, Pambula, Merimbula, Eden.

I’m least looking forward to … Reminding my kids to share the housework and chores. Any tips out there?!

The best swimming pool in Canberra is … The swimming pool I dream of, when I know that the 45,000 people of West Belconnen deserve *one*public*pool*. Can I buy a share in it, and make sure it happens? I would make an increase in my mortgage debt, to make it happen, however modest my humble share would be. Any other investors out there? Some families of 4 humans have one pool in their gardens. Can 45,000 humans have one public pool? Ummm. (I duck my head for word eggs).

My favourite freshwater swimming hole is … The chook water bucket in my backyard is probably the closest. Lake G might be toxic at the moment, and Ginninderra Falls is closed. I dunno.

The best beach on the NSW coast … Old childhood faves are:
Sydney: Bronte, of course, including the pool and rock pool, Clovelly, Coogee, Nielsen Park.
Teenage faves:
Central Coast: Terrigal, Avoca, Spoon Bay, Maitland Bay.
Hyams Beach.
Sapphire Coast: anywhere is beautiful.

My favourite summer drink is … Tea. Lemon or ginger drinks.

My ice-cream of choice is … I am abstaining from too much ice-cream and doing yogurt. I do love ice-cream.

The salads I like to eat in summer are … Anything. Can you chop it for me? I will eat it.

The al fresco dining spot I’ll be hanging out in this summer is … Back steps of my house, looking at my green garden.

The sport I’m looking forward to playing this summer is … Walking around the beautiful quiet streets where I live.

When it’s too hot to be outside I’ll be … Reading or watching films indoors.

The must-attend summer event this year is … Enjoying good health.

The summer flicks I’m planning to see are … Not sure. I’ve been catching up on films, on Stan and Netflix.

On my holiday reading pile this year are … Trying to use Kippax Library more, and I borrowed some books by an old boss who passed away recently, plus some books I have not read before but want to. Also, some gardening mags from Kippax Library, like Earth Garden. It’s amazing what is sitting on the shelves there, at zero cost to residents, after paying rates, and reading library books is totally recycling paper. We have some real gems in that library. Thanks to the Australian Democrats politician Roslyn Dundas for making Kippax Library happen. I watched and photographed it being built.

Vanessa Jones runs a Facebook page called Canberra Ideas with Vanessa Jones, sharing content and ideas about community, culture, politics, infrastructure, education and environment about Belconnen & Kippax.

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If you were buying a share in it, it wouldn’t be a public pool, would it?

Belconnen already has Cisac, the AIS, and Big Splash (plus Kingswim Macgregor). You can access all of them by bus in under 20 minutes from Kippax.

What’s wrong with the public pool in Belconnen? You have blue rapid buses going to the town centre on a regular basis plus it is a 10 minute (max) drive, 20-30 minute bike ride away.

Big problem putting a pool in Kippax is it would only serve half of the West Belconnen catchment area. Basically Holt, Latham, Higgins, Macgregor, Dunlop and the western part of Charnwood. Other parts of West Belconnen, namely Fraser, Melba, Flynn, Florey, Spence, Evatt etc it is easier to get to Belconnen than to kippax sonyour catchment has now dropped to around 20,000 max.

Might be justifiable when the new cross border development happens but now nope. Might be why someone hasn’t dug into their pockets and built one.

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