Following the 2011 flood that essentially destroyed the main Woodlawn Regional Park at the Souris River and caused great damage to the Boundary Dam site, those areas are now nearly fully recovered.
"We're extremely pleased with the recovery, the parks have been totally rejuvenated and have been filled right up on weekends," said Greg Hoffort, board member of Woodlawn Regional Park.
According to Hoffort, the majority of the $2 million in funding provided by the Provincial Disaster Assistance Program (PDAP) has been spent on complete restorations of 90 campsites at the main park and another 60 restorations surrounding it. The grounds surrounding the campsites have also been repaired, as well as the Doug Third Hall and Rotary Hall, alongside the theatre and sports fields nearby. Work has also been done at the Boundary site.
"To meet the short-term need, we built 30 campsites at the Boundary Dam park," said Hoffort, adding this was done because out of the 120 campsites that were entirely wiped out at the main site, 30 of them were permanently destroyed from erosion and had to be relocated.
Fifty additional sites are to be built at the Boundary Dam site, which Hoffort said are not a part of the PDAP recovery efforts.
The roads alongside both parks have also been restored with the help of the RM of Estevan.
"We're most grateful that they chose to resurface those roads this year," said Hoffort.
Aside from some sewer sites in the main park, which the Woodlawn board is considering to replace this fall, the two Woodlawn parks are fully functioning.
"It's wrapping up, and it was a very successful recovery," said Hoffort.
Aaron-LeeSoparlo, the recently appointed manager of Woodlawn Regional Park, said it has been great to see both parks back in full operation, and the community support that was behind the recovery efforts.
"I'm an outsider coming in, but the support has been tremendous, and I think there's a great group of people in this community that really want their parks back. It's great to see everybody's efforts pay off and have the park back up and running as quickly as it did."
