How to make my town more child-friendly?

[Ninjasling]

I'm in a small town in west Oxon which has lots of new housing, an expanding primary school, and a big local tourist attraction. It's a fab place to live!

But it has an older than average demographic and not much to do for children. How do we go about changing that? We have no nursery centre, the parks are for teenagers, there's one weird children's shop (lots of expensive boutiques/antiques etc), no local parenting groups that I know of except church/council run ones.

I'd love to see more activities for children. Any advice?

Hi Ninjasling,
It sounds as though there's loads of untapped potential where you live! I can see why you're frustrated by the lack of activities given that in many ways it's such a wonderful place for a family.
I wonder if it's worth contacting some providers of baby/toddler activities to see if they can run groups from your local community centre? Off the top of my head I can think of Music bugs and Sing and Sign. You might get some ideas of companies to approach here
local.mumsnet.com/oxford/preschool-classes

Also, would you consider starting your own group? There are a couple of lovely groups in East Oxford that are run by and for parents. Generally people take it in turns to open up the venue/provide drinks etc. One is in a community garden and the children have a great time running around outside and enjoying their picnic lunch. Perhaps there is a rural location nearby where you could meet? Or maybe your local tourist attraction has somewhere you could hire cheaply? They might want to give something back to the local community?! It might take a bit of an effort to get it started but it's amazing how quickly word spreads!

If you do any of the above then please keep us posted at Mumsnet! You can use this space and the Oxfordshire site to tell people what's happening (listings are free). You might even want to become a 'Local Ambassador' (I will write a separate post to explain what this involves).