Let there be light.
Lac La Biche’s newest park area is lit up for the holidays. Almost a third of the small trees and shrubs in McArthur Park have been decorated with holiday lights to brighten up the recreation space that is undergoing a three-year, $10 million revamp.
The festive lighting has always been part of the upgrade to the recreation and leisure space that once held the community’s main baseball and slowpitch diamonds.
Gary Harman, Lac La Biche County’s general manager of recreation and social services, said municipal staff planned the park’s changes – that include more than 120,000 square feet of grass areas, benches, walking paths, a skate park and a concrete gathering space – to enhance access for leisure and recreation for residents. The lights are part of that overall enhancement.
“We always strive to enhance our parks and the community,” he told Lakeland This Week, explaining that 33 of about 100 trees and shrubs have been decorated.
Each of the lit-up trees, Harman explained, has power available nearby to keep them on. Lac La Biche County, he said, hired a contractor to do the work, adding that it took four to five days to complete the installation of the bright holiday lights.
The switch was flicked on the lights in the middle of November.
According to Harman, the festive lights will stay on into the new year. “Everything will stay lit up until at least after Ukrainian Christmas,” he said.
The lights are not currently on a timer and have been on through the day and night hours. As they are LED bulbs, additional costs for running 24 hours-a-day, are minimal. According to online sources, LED lights last 25 times longer than incandescent lighting and use 75 per cent less energy.
Harman said this is the first year that the County has added lights to trees in local parks. Municipal officials aren’t ruling out the possibility that other park areas under municipal management could see similar illuminated ideas in the future.
