The Ernakulam Children’s Park that was once the most popular park in the district is drawing much lesser number of children, despite the ongoing summer vacation and its strategic location.
This has widely been attributed to a pair of trains, which were a hit among children, idling during the past several months for want of timely upkeep. A visit to the park on Thursday showed that the trains were parked in a semi-abandoned condition in the weed-infested western side of the park. The renewable energy park established jointly by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy and the State government’s Agency for New and Renewable Energy Research and Technology (ANERT) too is in a similar condition.
The park is maintained by the District Council for Child Welfare (DCCW), while the Ernakulam District Tourism Promotion Council (DTPC) maintains a pond at one end of the premises where visitors can do pedal boating for a fee. Kerala Tourism had allotted ₹4 crore to renovate the premises, considering that hundreds of children used to converged here during evenings and through the day during weekends.
