Sea Isle's new playground uses rubberized material on ground
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
SEA ISLE CITY — The playground under construction on Central Avenue will feature an expensive rubberized material that cushions falls depending on the height of the swing sets or jungle gyms.
The material, called a “poured in place safety surface,” replaces mulch, which is also used to limit injuries on playground equipment.
The city is currently building the $430,000 playground to replace Play By the Bay, the community-built playground demolished last year amid concerns that the pressure-treated wood used was unsafe.
Pressure-treated wood uses chemicals such as arsenic to protect it from bugs.
The city is paying for the playground through Cape May County's Municipal Public Improvements Pooled Financing Program, which freeholders passed this year to distribute surplus county funds.
City Engineer Andrew Previti said the contractor, the Whirl Corp. of Fort Monmouth, will finish in mid-June.
Previti said the safety surface on the playground varies and is coordinated with the height of the equipment.
Equipment ranges in fall height from 2 feet to 10 feet, Previti said.
The surface material absorbs impact and is intended to prevent neck and head injury, Previti said.
“The contractor has to be very precise because the height of the equipment has to be exact,” Previti said.
Heather Olsen, operations director for the National Program for Playground Safety, said the type of surface Sea Isle City is using has been around for about seven years and many companies now manufacture it.
Olsen said the surface needs to be properly tested and installed in the correct areas and correlated to the height of playground equipment to be effective.
The city uses the surface partly at its playground on John F. Kennedy Boulevard in downtown Sea Isle City, Previti said.
The surface is located at the bottoms of swings, for example, while the rest of the playground uses mulch, he said.
Previti said the surface costs more than mulch. But he said the surface is safe and does not need the upkeep that mulch requires. Public works crews pack the playground with mulch once or more a year.
Previti said the rubber also makes the playground area more accessible to parents in wheelchairs watching their children.
“It's really a state-of-the-art playground,” Mayor Leonard Desiderio said. “I know the kids are waiting for it, because I hear it all the time.”
To e-mail Brian Ianieri at The Press:
BIanieri@pressofac.com
