Last week the government announced plans to hold a design competition for a revamp of the Mount Ainslie summit.
At the moment, there’s not a lot up there. Some benches, an info sign, some parking spots and that’s about it. And I reckon that’s exactly how it should stay.
I’m not opposed to new benches or new signs or new landscaping, but there has been mention of the possibility of having a cafe or restaurant built up there.
Minister Rattenbury did say “I don’t think anyone in Canberra would want to see anything gaudy on this landscape, anything that was over the top,” but I think if a cafe was allowed to be built up there, it would look tacky and would ruin the peacefulness of Mount Ainslie.
I know they want to attract more people to visit Mount Ainslie, but if there was a busy cafe up there and a lot of noise, I wouldn’t go up there anymore. I’d go to Mount Taylor instead. I don’t go for a run up a mountain to be met by a billion people at the top.
If people absolutely must have a coffee when they get to the summit, I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing some kind of agreement in place with a coffee van and them being allowed to turn up on weekends or something similar.
Mount Ainslie is a nature reserve. Months of construction on a new facility I think would be just awful. I would avoid like the plague. Let’s keep Mount Ainslie as it is.