New Dog Off-Leash Areas

We’re about to begin the community consultation for a new dog off-leash area on the edge of the Botany Aquatic Centre, just beyond the Big Splash. We’ve talked about this area in the past and now we’ve formalised the plans, which would see a new off-leash area as well as retaining the existing function area at the pool.

The Aquatic Centre and adjacent Booralee Park is a major recreation area in the City and as the population grows so too do the numbers of canine companion animals. We’ve put in off-leash areas for dogs in other parts of the City (and a couple more are about to get underway, which I’ll outline at the end of this item) and it was logical to utilise this area in Botany. The function area at the pool was not being used as much as it could and, after careful examination, Council decided to examine splitting the area into two – for functions and for dogs. There are some exiting fences and we’ll need some more to keep the dogs away from the function area but we feel it can all work out for everyone. 

We’ll circulate our plans to nearby residents in the next couple of weeks and then get local feedback, which will be part of the final decision. 

We have approvede two new off-leash areas for dogs – at Firmstone Reserve down in Pagewood and High Street Reserve, which runs between High Street and King Street, Mascot. Work on the Firmstone Reserve area will begin in the near future while High Street Reserve may take a little longer to get underway as we have a few things to finalise with Sydney Water.