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Wikipedia / Adventure playground

An adventure playground is a specific type of playground for children. Adventure playgrounds can take many forms, ranging from "natural playgrounds" to "junk playgrounds", and are typically defined by an ethos of unrestricted play, the presence of playworkers (or "wardens"), and the absence of adult-manufactured or rigid play-structures. Adventure playgrounds are frequently defined in contrast to playing fields, contemporary-design playgrounds made by adult architects, and traditional-equipment play areas containing adult-made rigid play-structures like swings, slides, seesaws, and climbing bars.

History

Adventure playgrounds are based on an idea from Danish landscape architect Carl Theodor Sørensen, who noticed that children were more fascinated by piles of scrap materials than the playgrounds that he had designed. In 1931, he articulated his vision of a "junk playground in which children could create and shape, dream and imagine a reality" that offered the play opportunities of rural areas to children in cities.

In 1943, the first adventure playground was set up by a Workers Cooperative Housing Association in Emdrup, Denmark, during the German occupation of the 1940s. The playground grew out of the spirit of resistance to Nazi occupation and parents' fears that "their children's play might be mistaken for acts of sabotage by soldiers". The 1946 book Why Not Use Our Bomb Sites Like This? caused "the idea of transforming bomb sites into 'junk playgrounds' to spread in the United Kingdom. The book, written by an English landscape architect and child welfare advocate Marjory Allen, discussed the Emdrup playground. Previous youth workers, including an art therapist in a Blitz-era play center in London, had identified permissive play as a tool to combat childhood aggression.

Harry Shier, in Adventure Playgrounds: An Introduction (1984), defines an adventure playground as "an area fenced off and set aside for children" where they can "play freely, in their own way, in their own time" and "build and shape the environment according to their own creative vision". The spaces have been referred to with English terms such as "junk playground" (a calque from the Danish term skrammellegeplads), "waste material playgrounds", or "bomb-site adventure playgrounds". The term "adventure playground" was adopted in the United Kingdom "in an effort to make the ‘junk’ playground concept more palatable to local authorities".

British architect Simon Nicholson praised adventure playgrounds for teaching "the relationship between experiment and play, community involvement, the catalytic value of play leaders, and indeed the whole concept of a free society in miniature.'" He argued that in a play area, or any environment, "the degree of inventiveness and creativity, and the possibility of discovery" are correlated with the number and variety of what he called "loose parts", such as old tires, hammers and nails, mud, and random found objects.

Play advocates have emphasized the importance of adventure playgrounds for children of color in the United States, where policing "can feel like a kind of occupation".

List of adventure playgrounds

As at 2015 or earlier, there were about 1000 adventure playgrounds in Europe, most of them in England, Denmark, France, Germany, The Netherlands, and Switzerland. There are also adventure playgrounds in Japan.

This is an incomplete list.

The Americas

  1. Canada

  2. TELUS Spark, in Calgary, Alberta has a Junkyard Playground open in the summer months.

  3. The city of Calgary, in Alberta, Canada, piloted a mobile adventure playground in five city parks during the summer of 2016.

  4. Toronto Ontario hosted an Adventure Playground from 1974 until the mid-1980s. It was a part of the revitalization of the waterfront called Harbourfront Centre.

  5. The City of Coquitlam in British Columbia created an Adventure Playground in the summer of 2018 as a pilot project.

  6. United States

  7. The Yard, established in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1949, the first adventure playground in the United States

  8. Adventure Playground in Berkeley, California, established in 1979

  9. Huntington Beach Adventure Playground in Huntington Beach, California, established in the 1970s

  10. Adventure Playground in Irvine, California

  11. Sacramento Adventure Playground in Sacramento, California

  12. The Hands-on-Nature Anarchy Zone in Ithaca, New York, established in 2012

  13. Adventure Playground at The Parish School in Houston, Texas

  14. Play:groundNYC on Governors Island in New York City, established in 2015

  15. SCV Adventure Play Foundation in Val Verde, CA.

  16. Heckscher Playground in New York City's Central Park

  17. Tarr Family Playground, also in Central Park in New York City

Asia

  1. Japan

  2. The Setagaya Play Park or "Junk Playground" in Hanegi Park in Setagaya ward, Tokyo, Japan.

  3. Children’s Dream Park 川崎市子ども夢パーク (or "Yume Park") in Shimosakunobe, Kawasaki Takatsu Ward, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan.

Australia

Australian Capital Territory

  • POD Playground at the National Arboretum, Canberra.

  • Ridgeline Park Playground,Denman Prospect

  • Ruth Park Playground, Coombs

New South Wales

  • Bungendore Park. Bungendore

  • Carberry Park Adventure Playground, Gundagai

  • The Adventure Playground Jubilee Park. Cootamundra

Northern Territory

Queensland

  • Flagstone Adventure Playground and Skate Park. Flagstone.

  • Hinterland Adventure Playground. Cooroy

  • The Jungle Adventure Play. Tingalpa

  • Hervey Bay Adventure Playground. Pialba

South Australia

Tasmania

  • Kingston Park Playground. Hobart

  • Riverbend Park. Launceston

Victoria

  • Hays Paddock playground, Kew East

  • KidsTown Adventure Playground. Shepparton

  • Lake Pertobe Adventure Playground. Warrnambool

  • The Venny, Kensington Adventure Playground. Kensington.

  • Community Bank® Adventure Playground Hadfield Park. Wallan

Western Australia

Europe

  1. Denmark

Denmark has several adventure playgrounds, now known as Byggelegeplads (Building-playground) and formerly as Skrammellegeplads (Junk-playground). From the first site in Emdrup, the idea spread across the country and at the height of the popularity in the 1960s, there were about 100 adventure playgrounds in the country. Present active adventure playgrounds in Denmark includes:

Literature

Film

Arts and Theatre

See also

Notes

References