Amber Livinstone admits she is not a basketball enthusiast, but the executive director of Downtown North Bay admits she has seen a lot of activity at the new city multi-use courts located downtown behind the bus terminal at Oak Street in North Bay.
The new courts opened in the spring and Livingstone is impressed with all the activity.
"I think so, I would have had no idea that basketball courts were such a need in our community for young and old people alike," said Livingstone during the Bay Block Party media conference on Monday.
"Honestly, I pull in in the morning at 8:30 a.m. and there are people already at the court and when I leave at 4 p.m. there are people on the court. They are there all day and there are groups, and leagues in town that are hosting events and they are doing drills so it is really exciting."
See related: New multi-use courts are now available for public use
The courts include one full-sized court and one half-sized court. Painted lines will accommodate basketball, ball hockey, and indoor soccer.
The project was largely funded by a federal and provincial grant of more than $300,000 provided through the COVID-19 Resilience Infrastructure Stream of the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program.
Livingstone believes the new traffic is good for the downtown.
"We have a whole new age group of people that are frequenting the downtown quite a bit more," she said.
"Then they get hungry and they go get a bite to eat, they go get a drink and it is going to become their downtown as they age a little bit more and we are going to see that those are our new patrons to some of the boutiques and shops downtown which is really exciting."
The City of North Bay will be hosting an official ribbon-cutting for the multi-use courts on Friday Aug. 26 at 10 a.m.
Mayor Al McDonald will be joined by a representative for Nipissing-Timiskaming MP Anthony Rota, Nipissing MPP Vic Fedeli, and members of the North Bay Spartans basketball club.
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