What is your favourite park in our neighbourhood? Is it Giovanni Caboto Park? If it is - and I bet it is for many people reading this - boy, do I have an interesting idea for you.

Giovanni Caboto Park is the centre of our neighbourhood for many of us. It has beautiful trees and lots of space for activities like soccer, sitting, having a picnic, playing, and just enjoying the outdoors. The statue and the fountain make the park special. In the summer, the splash park makes it really fun. In the winter, it is a good place to play in the snow. It is also right across the street from the Italian Centre, where they sell great doughnuts that many kids like to eat in the park.

The park currently has swings for babies and saucer-type swings for kids and anyone else. Saucer swings are fun but you can’t swing properly in them. So, unfortunately, our terrific park lacks proper swings for anyone who isn’t a baby. Proper swings are swings that go high in the air, are wide so that even in the winter when you’re all bundled up you can sit comfortably and swing, wide enough for your arms to be comfortable, and high enough off the ground so even a grown-up can swing comfortably. 

Having proper swings like that would make our beautiful park even more fun. Do you like to swing? Maybe you like to imagine who-knows-what while you’re on a swing, such as that you’re an airplane, for example a Spitfire, in battle over the North Sea in the Battle of Britain. Some kids like to swing to think and relax. Imagine being able to soar way up in the air in our beautiful park on a summer’s day with the fountain on and trees all green. Wow! Let’s get swings for Giovanni Caboto Park.

Michael Alexander is nine and lives in McCauley. This is his first published article.