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School Playgrounds to Undergo Major Changes

By 250 News

This wooden playground structure at Hart Highlands School will be dismantled this summer (opinion250 staff photo)

Work begins this summer on the removal of playground equipment from schools in the region.

Reports on the playgrounds, show many components will have to be removed as they are not CSA approved, or pose significant dangers to students. There are pieces of equipment which are too high, pose danger for head injuries, or strangulation. In short, they are accidents waiting to happen.

School District 57 Trustee Lois Boone says in most cases it just isn’t economical or possible to repair the equipment. In fact, there are so many school playgrounds with dangerous equipment, the job to remove the items will be spread over four years.
The cost to remove the equipment will be absorbed in the maintenance budget.

The cost for new equipment is another story. Boone recognizes the playground equipment, was, for the most part, paid for by the Parent Advisory Council’s for schools. Finding new funds for equipment will be difficult for some of those “PAC’s”. 


This is the new CSA approved playground equipment at Hart Highlands School

Boone says she has offered to work with the PAC’s to help them find sources of funding “The replacement cost would depend on the size of the playground, it could range from $15 thousand to $25 thousand depending on what size they want. What we are suggesting is that we might want to go to a supplier and say look we have 36 playgrounds that have to be replaced in the future, can you give us a deal if you get that contract?”

All the wooden structures will be torn down. Schools set for removal projects this summer are: Westwood, Hart Highlands, Malaspina to be followed by removal of non conforming playgrounds at closed schools, Highland, Meadow and Gladstone . 







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