Ask RiotACT: Apartment gyms

In mid 2019 I’m moving to a new apartment building. It won’t have a gym. However, I’ll give up my car once settled, and I’m contemplating turning my allocated basement carspace into a mini gym.

My space is between an access driveway and the retaining wall. I’ll have ample room for a bench, dumbbells, kettlebells and hopefully a cable crossover machine. If I think it won’t disappear, I might even leave the bench and weights out for other residents to use. Failing that, I can pack and stack it into the adjacent storage cage.

It’s either that or get the bus to Erindale pool a few times a week.

It’s sad but every gym I’ve seen in Greenway itself is just awful. There’s one boxing gym very close by that’s open two hours a day, five days a week (!!!). There’s a gym at the Tuggeranong pool but it’s just one tiny room with a few cable machines. There’s Club Fluoro (too big, too modern, too slick, and just far enough away to be inconvenient when you’re using the bus). There’s Anytime Fitness, which was even harder to find, is equally slick, has a stairwell out front that looks like a slip and slide that’s there to drum up business for a facial reconstruction surgeon every time it rains on leg day.

I’ve been through several slick gyms before (fancy lighting, fancy carpet, fancy machines, all with matching logos, fancy glossy marketing brochures, fancy multi-page contracts that resemble that line from Hotel California (you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave!). Never again.

Jaded? Perhaps. QBN has me spoiled for choice with two good old fashioned unpretentious gyms, with lots of weights, lots of space, no slimy marketing gloss, and retrofitted 24 hour access fobs.

Hi Donald
I do! email me with the details of your project: jacobscara@gmail.com