Charles Kernan Reserve Barbecue
In 2010 a BBQ and picnic facilities were installed in Charles Kernan Reserve, Abercrombie Street, Darlington, as part of the park upgrade works. The electric barbecue unit is free to use and is operable between the hours of 9am – 9pm seven days a week.
The City continues to receive mixed feedback about this facility and its impact to local residents. We are inviting further comment from the community to enable the City to determine whether the barbecue should remain or be removed from the park.
You are invited to send any comments, stating your preference to retain or remove the barbecue unit by Friday 8th March 2013 and quoting file number 2013/036837.
By email: council@cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au Or By post:
Attention Adrian Kilsby Parks Technical Officer
City of Sydney
GPO Box 1591
Sydney NSW 2001
If you would like more information about Charles Kernan Reserve and the barbecue please contact Adrian on 85124267.
Yours sincerely
JOEL JOHNSON
Manager Parks, Trees & Aquatic Facilities
The following response appeared in SMH’s Heckler Column on 7 March:
Seething over sizzle whinger
Illustration: Simon Letch
Dear Clover Moore,
I’m writing regarding the mooted removal of the barbecue from
the Charles Kernan Reserve, Abercrombie Street, Darlington. (I hope you
don’t mind me getting in touch via Heckler, but it’s an analogue
version of Facebook that keeps Friends of the Barbecue in the loop.)
A letter from the Sydney City Council tells locals: ”The
City continues to receive mixed feedback about this [barbecue] facility
and its impact to local residents.” (Er, try ”impact on”.)
Now I’m just guessing, but I suspect the only thing ”mixed”
that the barbecue continues to receive are the grills cooked on it by
hundreds of park users who enjoy the camaraderie engendered by sizzling
flesh together (or tofu, as the case may be – for we are an open-minded
community). I mean, exactly what is this ”mixed feedback?” Who rings
council to praise a barbecue?
No, I’ll go out on a limb here and posit that, in opposition
to the silent majority of happy barbecue users, the only ”mixed
feedback” consists of the complaints of precisely one NIMBY whinger,
who lives in that glorified tin-shed apartment complex overlooking the
park and barbecue ”facility”.
I can’t prove it, Clover, but I’ll bet if you checked you’ll
find that this anti-barbecue agitator is the same NIMBY whinger who
successfully lobbied you for the removal of the basketball hoop from the
park a couple of years back. The sound of kids laughing and bouncing a
ball at 7.30 on a summer’s evening must have penetrated the NIMBY’s
eyrie, playing merry hell with reruns of Heartbeat and To The Manor Born.
People bang on about the erosion of ”community” and how we
don’t even know who our neighbours are. Outside of pubs, the park is one
of the last patches of unmediated social interaction possible, a little
sliver of green in which to romp with kids and dogs, chat with
strangers and, yes, pick meat from teeth together.
Take away the basketball, take away the barbecue, and what
will the Grinch target next? The slippery dip and swings? ”Death
traps!” The community garden? ”The pumpkins groan at night!”
The bland and the beige never sleep, Clover, but you can save
the barbecue in the Charles Kernan Reserve. It’s what Charles Kernan –
whoever he was – would have wanted.
Tug Dumbly