Construction crews are installing a long-planned armour-stone wall along the beach at Atherley Community Park in Ramara Township, Ontario, giving a volunteer board’s waterfront project a visible start after work planned for 2025 was delayed. BarrieToday reported on Oct. 12 that crews were at work. The township’s construction notice, issued a week earlier, had scheduled the work to begin Oct. 7.
The wall is planned to stretch about 200 feet and stand roughly 20 inches high. It grew out of a broader beautification effort led by the Atherley Community Centre Board, which helps manage the park for the township. In September, OrilliaMatters reported that board members hoped the stones would help manage geese on the beach and keep grass and weeds from moving into the lake. They also pictured the wall as a place for visitors to sit or swimmers to drape towels. Those are the board’s intended uses, not a claim that the work will produce a measured environmental change.
Ramara’s council highlights say the park hosted the Aug. 29 Harvest Festival. The mayor noted the strong turnout and thanked volunteers; Councillor Dana Tuju credited the Atherley board with organizing the event and showcasing the park, local farmers and artisans. The wall is a separate project, but it is taking shape in a place the township and board already use for local gatherings.
The township’s Oct. 5 notice said construction would take about a week, depending on weather and site conditions. It asked residents to stay clear of the work zone and said temporary restrictions would apply to part of the beach while the rest of the park remained open. BarrieToday reported the same estimate on Oct. 12, when installation was still underway. Neither report confirmed that the wall had been completed.
The project was originally expected to happen in 2025. OrilliaMatters reported in September that a spring ice storm delayed that plan, and the work later ran into permit, contractor and supplier problems. The original contractor reconsidered after the permit process took longer than expected; the board found another landscaper. When the original stone supplier could not commit, members found another supplier. The plan moved forward through a series of practical setbacks rather than a single announcement or construction date.
The project also came close to being pushed into another budget cycle. Atherley Community Centre Board members attended a Sept. 14 council meeting as a motion to defer the work was being considered. Local reporting said councillors Joe Gough and Deputy Mayor Keith Bell pressed for it to proceed this year. Board chair Steve Hinton said he had worried the work might be dropped and credited councillors Dana Tuju and Gough with helping keep earlier work from going to waste.
Ramara’s council highlights record a Committee of the Whole recommendation to proceed in 2026, with up to $15,000 from the board’s reserve, and a request for staff to report the final cost. BarrieToday reported that Bot Aggregates Ltd. donated the stones and that the township agreed to install them. The project therefore combines a board reserve, donated material and municipal crews and equipment. The local report said reserve funds are generally earned by volunteers and held by the township; the township may also subsidize major board expenditures.
A second idea discussed by the board should not be confused with the wall project. Members have proposed six memorial benches facing the water or placed in shaded areas. BarrieToday reported that the proposal remains with the township for consideration and was unlikely to be reviewed before 2027 because Ramara has not established a program for it. The wall is the part of the board’s waterfront plans that is now being installed; the benches have not been approved.
For Hinton, the township relationship mattered as much as getting the work scheduled. He described staff as “wonderful to work with” after the project faced repeated delays. The local report also described township staff, machinery and installation support joining donated stone and board funds to carry the plan through. That is a grounded kind of community improvement: a volunteer-managed park, local materials and municipal work coming together to move a repeatedly delayed project into installation.
Visitors can continue using the portions of Atherley Community Park outside the marked construction area, according to the township. People are being asked to follow posted signs and barriers until work is finished. The final cost and completion date have not been confirmed in the sources reviewed for this story. For now, the visible change is the beginning of the wall itself, after a local board kept a practical waterfront idea moving through delays and into construction.
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