PlayRight scores funding for Ingersoll playground

Wednesday, 19 March 2014 12:57

PlayRight Ingersoll President Dave Cripps, (right) along with Adam Funnell, (Vice President Community Relations) and MP Dave MacKenzie show off a rendering of the Garnett Elliot Park playground.

Garnett Elliot Park will get recreational upgrade.

INGERSOLL -- A volunteer based charity established to rejuvenate playgrounds in and around Ingersoll is getting a big assist for its latest project thanks to the federal government.

PlayRight Playgrounds Ingersoll is receiving $45,000 from the Enabling Accessibility Fund to improve accessibility for Canadians with disabilities. This funding will assist in making the playground at Garnett Elliot Park in Ingersoll be more accessible with the construction of an exterior ramp, increasing colour contrast, and installing accessible playground structures.

"Garnett Elliot Park in particular doesn't have much in the way of play equipment right now," says PlayRight Playgrounds Ingersoll President Dave Cripps, who discussed the project Wednesday at Victoria Park Community Centre.

"The playgrounds in Ingersoll have all been around since I was old enough to play on them myself, so it's time to do some rejuvenation," Cripps said.

"This playground itself is fully accessible, the two ramps will provide wheelchair accessibility, there's tactile equipment around the middle of the structure which will allow blind kids a chance to feel and play as well, plus there's a roller slide which kids can roll down like a conveyer belt."

Cripps says upgrades aren't just coming in the form of new play equipment -- but also in the form of Fibar Engineered Wood Fiber playground chips. Fibar, which is made of virgin wood fiber is designed and tested to provide a surface springy enough to cushion falls, yet firm enough for wheelchairs. Another advantage: Rain water passes through Fibar playground mulch, so kids can play right after it rains.

"It's an engineered plastic wood, it's twelve inches deep and compressible, so it's compact enough to meet all kinds of safety standards as well as compact enough to be able to drive a wheelchair right over top of it."

The Garnett Elliot Park structure now counts as PlayRight's third playground project in Ingersoll. Cripps says the new playground should be fully constructed and ready to go by June -- in time for summer festivities.