Pegasus residents will get their first look inside the new $5.3m Pegasus community Centre this Saturday, at its official opening.

Residents from the area and nearby communities are invited to join community leaders and hosts, the Waimakariri District Council, on Saturday, October 10, between 12 pm and 4 pm to tour the facility, connect with neighbours, and learn about future opportunities and activities in the space.

The new purpose-built, 400 square metre facility serves a growing community, with the town now home to more than 4700 residents.

Built on council-owned land on the Pegasus lakefront, near the town's retail area and health hub, the new centre’s main function room can be partitioned into two sections with capacity for 66 and 110 seats respectively or combined into one large function space.

The space was designed to cater for large events including conferences, fundraisers, formal balls and large-scale meetings.

Accessible from Pegasus Main Street, the new building offers a spacious reception area, complete with a book cave which welcomes visitors to the facility and includes an open-plan kitchen.

It also includes a small meeting room and a formal boardroom with a kitchenette.

Community interest in building a dedicated community centre in the town has been a hot topic since December 2015.

Until recently, the town’s community centre was based in premises formerly tenanted by the local pharmacy, and was a pet project of the active Pegasus Residents’ Association who manned it with volunteers.

A dedicated community centre had been in the pipeline for several years, until council announced funding had been set aside in the 2021/31 Long Term Plan.

The new Pegasus Community Centre is one of three key building projects in the Waimakariri district due for completion this year or early next year, including the Rangiora after-hours medical centre and the BNZ corner redevelopment in Rangiora.