As the busiest provincial park in the province (with 1.5 million visitors a year!), Wasaga Beach Provincial Park handles a LOT of trash.
We want to encourage our visitors to throw their trash in appropriate areas and protect our natural spaces.
That’s why we’re proud to share our new partnership where trash and art collide: barrels of art!
A garbage epidemic
Each year, park staff remove approximately 200,000 kg of trash from the park.
That is the equivalent of more than 18 school buses!
Much of this trash ends up in areas where it shouldn’t be, such as along the sandy shores of Wasaga Beach’s 14km beach.
Our park staff works very hard to keep it beautiful and clean, but we also want our visitors to do their part.
We knew we needed a creative and unique way to encourage our visitors to participate in proper waste management.
Where art and trash collide
That’s why Wasaga Beach Provincial Park, in coordination with the City of Wasaga Beach, partnered with local artists and schools to develop our beautiful new art trash barrels!
Local artists were given park-specific themes to create their concepts, which included prominent locations in the provincial park, recreational activities, and important natural and cultural heritage stories.
Once designed, the artists worked with local school students to bring their concepts to life.
Barrel depicting HMS Nancy
Wasaga Beach Provincial Park and City of Wasaga Beach staff worked together to coordinate the project, facilitate painting at local schools, and display the art barrels throughout the provincial park areas.
Find garbage-spiration
The art barrels are designed to provoke thought and conversation, encourage appropriate visitor behavior, and engage the local community, specifically children, in park stewardship activities.
We hope that having these new barrels will inspire our visitors to think about where their rubbish should go and help us keep our protected areas litter free.
Visitors will find art barrels at various locations in the park, including the boardwalk at Beach Area 2, the Nancy Island Historic Site, the Schooner Town Heritage Site, the Nordic and Trails Center, and the entrance gates of the park. park.
Keep our park beautiful
Next time you visit Wasaga Beach Provincial Park, keep your eyes open and see how many of our new artistic barrels you can spot.
And of course… don’t forget to throw out your trash!
Thank you to everyone who helped us make this project a success!
Contributing artists:
Participating elementary schools:
- Worsley Primary School
- San Noel Chabanel Catholic School