Oban playpark accessibility praised despite three-month closure
Oban’s £180,000 community playpark, which closed almost three months ago after it failed a safety inspection, has been praised in a new national guide to ‘creating accessible play spaces’.
A parent group called Friends of Oban Playpark successfully raised more than £334,000 to replace the old playpark beside Atlantis Leisure, which also closed for safety reasons in 2014, with two new ones – a big park for ages five to 15, and a smaller one for under fives – plus refurbishing the millennium garden.
The big playpark, which cost £180,000 to build, opened in November 2015, but just two years later its surface began to crack and bubble as it ‘sank into a swamp’, and families grew impatient to see it fixed before children or grandparents tripped and hurt themselves.
Argyll and Bute Council, which maintains the playpark, closed it following a safety inspection in March, explaining: ‘The safety of the children and families who use the playpark is our key priority. Because of the risk of injury from uneven flooring, we have closed part of the park temporarily and are in contact with the contractor about progressing repairs.’
It was set to re-open by the middle of May, but a council spokesperson added on Monday: ‘A meeting is scheduled with our contractor for later this week to discuss the next steps.’
Friends’ chairperson Lyndsay Elliott said the closure was damaging tourism. She added: ‘I was in the playpark gardens on Thursday for two hours, and there were three families on English half-term that went away disappointed because they had made the journey specifically to use the park and couldn’t. The impact of the closed space is damaging for our local children and to the wider tourist community.’
Last year the Friends of Oban Playpark received a Nancy Ovens Award for Play - ‘the Oscars of the play world’.
Now the playpark has been hailed in the new ‘Free to Play’ guide, launched this week in the Scottish Parliament, for its exemplar partnership between community groups and the local authority.
The ‘guide to creating accessible and inclusive public play spaces’, it says, ‘is designed to ensure that all children and young people, including those with additional support needs, can exercise their right to play in their local communities’.
The rest of the park remains open. The under-fives £95,000 playpark opened at the leisure centre’s 25th birthday party in September, adopting a pirate-ship theme from its neighbour.