ELORA – Access to the Elora Quarry for Grand River Conservation Area (GRCA) membership holders will now be a permanent feature of the membership.
An October report to the GRCA board recommended making the membership program become part of the regular operations of the Elora Quarry Conservation Area following a successful pilot program this past summer.
Prior to this summer, GRCA membership holders had to buy separate tickets to use the Elora Quarry for one of two four hour blocks at $10 per adult, $5 per child and $15 for parking.
The report said capacity at the Quarry is between 300 and 350 people at the beach with up to 175 parking spaces and a “heavy concentration of patrons can negatively impact both the user experience at the beach and the natural features.”
The GRCA began a pilot giving pass holders access to a weekday reservation program which was later extended to seven days a week by the end of the summer. The GRCA would cap the number of spaces available for membership holders at a maximum of 15 per cent of the total available reservations.
Membership holders still had to pay for parking.
The report said 250 GRCA membership transactions were processed for approximately 800 individual tickets.
“The 2024 season showed that the current percentage allotment for membership holders is meeting the demand as no one session was completely sold out of the membership portion,” the report stated. “This will be monitored for adjustment moving forward as we do with all admission operations, each year.”
