The Tribune

By RIEL MAJOR

THE Malcolm Park basketball court got a facelift due to the collective efforts of the Bahamas Striping Group of Companies, KW Pavers, and the Bahamas Public Parks and Public Beach.

Malcolm Park was in a poor state and needed to be renovated, according to Dr Allen Albury, of The Bahamas Striping Group, who said it is one of the most used parks in New Providence.

It now has a new acrylic surface, backboards, rims and paint job.

Dr Albury continued: “We replaced the last surface with the seal master cushioning surface which is a sports court surfacing material. It is cushion like in substance and therefore it allows players the benefit of having less injuries during play time in terms of using the court.”

“The material has a durability factor and will last for a number of years. As you can see we put it down in the 242 colours so we are really proud of this particular court.”

Shanendon Cartwright, Executive Chairman of the Bahamas Public Parks and Public Beaches Authority, said the project is a reflection of what a public/private partnership can do.

Mr Cartwright, St. Barnabas MP, said the park will be reopened sometime next week following the completion of a “few more technical things”.

“We’re looking forward to as we get into the early part of next week everybody will be able to enjoy the park,” he said.

“We still have some more work to be done and that’s going to be done over the next couple of weeks, but what we didn’t want to do is have the park completely closed down so when the court is opened up for youth. We will continue to do minor details around the park.”

Mr Cartwright said: “For me this is very personal for me I’ve had the opportunity to play on a number of parks over the last 42 years. I was fortunate enough to attend university on a basketball scholarship and parks in general are where dreams and aspirations are nurtured not only by young men of all communities but families from all walks of life.”

“The park is a very diverse place for Bahamians to enjoy because you know your families can come out here, they exercise, and they bring their kids out here. This is like a refuge and so we are very excited not only with what this does for this area in particular but what it does for the nurturing and the development for our young people.”

Mr Cartwright expressed his desire to one day have enough funding to revamp all the parks in New Providence.