Developments afoot at Jackson Dam
The owner of Creative Academy has assured that they are very conscious of their neighbours and while developments are afoot, access of the public to Jackson Dam will not be affected.
Six years ago, Creative Academy School of Excellence applied for a piece of land, a servitude that runs at the back of their property.
Just a week ago, the school started the excavation and compacting of the portion in the dam and the project is anticipated for completion before the end of the month.
This follows concerns and notices seen at Jackson Dam indicating that an area of 2400m2 would be rented out for the next five years.
The area that is being rented from the council encompasses a portion of space directly behind the school and will be directly accessible to learners and staff. The area will be fenced off by the school.
The area that will be fenced off for use by the school will not affect the access of the public to Jackson Dam in any manner.
According to Jenna Axsel, owner of Creative Academy in the Creative Academy Group, there are over 400 children and families who will benefit from this expansion.
“This area is at the back end of Jackson Dam and is very seldom used by anybody. We approached the council in 2016 and put in an application to lease that property from them. In February, their application was approved, and we’ve got a five-year lease with the council where we pay a monthly fee to utilise that piece of land,” she said.
Part of their lease is that they have to fence off that area and they are allowed to develop it into a sports field playground, which is an extension of their school.
“We have bought the property next door which is going to merge into one big school, which is the primary school. And those sports fields will benefit the children in those two schools. We are looking at a cricket pitch, netball and tennis courts. We’re going to cater for long jump and the rest of the space can be utilised for sports such as soccer and rugby,” explained Axsel.
Axsel reiterated that the area will be fenced off for their use and also because they don’t want children’s safety to be compromised.
“We can only use the land during the time that the park is open. There will be no late-night events that are going to interfere with the neighbours. We will time events carefully,” she said.
Once done, Axsel said the land will look almost exactly like it did before, except there will now be a fenced court and other sports equipment.
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