Perhaps the biggest benefits of living in a new estate is exactly that. It’s new. And on the North Coast, with a dozen or so estates competing for new buyers, the newness extends to the local parks.
In fact, the parks up this way are so impressive it’s been affectionately called a park arms race, with each estate trying to outdo the next. And leading the race, in our opinion, is the Amberton Flying Fox Park in Eglinton, a true frontier suburb along this coast.
The main event
The flying fox is, of course, the main feature. It’s a 40 metre, twin-line flying fox, which means you can race, your mates, your partner, your kids. It bounces as you fly along, and the slope gives you enough speed to have a laugh while also taking it seriously, because letting go would genuinely have consequences.
Beside it there’s a spider web for climbing, and nearby a slope that gets climbed with a rope on the way up and descended on a makeshift cardboard slide on the way down. Nobody designed that last part. The kids invented it, which is how you know the park is working.
Dog o’clock
The park also has an amphitheatre with built-in steps, where a regular crew of dog walkers gathers each evening around 5pm to discuss another chilled day on the coast. There are barbecues, walking paths, and two large ponds that fill with rainwater after a big dump of rain.
That last detail isn’t an accident. Look back at historical maps and the area of the park was a natural lake, the low point where the water on this stretch of the Swan Coastal Plain always gathered. The designers kept it that way. These days the wetland section has two bridges that let walkers cross over it, and give the kids a thrill to explore on wet days.
Built properly
The slopes around the park give the place character, as do the contours of the bush areas. It’s a genuinely enjoyable park to explore, to kick the footy, to play cricket, to ride bikes on the wide bike paths, originally modelled on Danish park design.
Call it a tribute to 2010s planning. It’s a modern, well-crafted environment built with respect for the natural water catchment beneath it. And now, a decade on, the trees and birdlife are taking hold, bringing a maturity to the place that’s satisfying for adults and kids alike.
The estates up here compete on parks because parks are what sell a suburb to a family. Fine by us. When the arms race produces places like this, everybody wins, especially the eight-year-olds.