Snug provides mobile play resource for market town
Sutcliffe Play has introduced Snug, a mobile play resource into the bare market square in Neston transforming it into a colourful and exciting free play facility for children and young people.
Sutcliffe Play approached Cheshire West and Chester Council and the local community group CAN (Community Activities in Neston), after hearing about their desire to make their new town square more child friendly and playable. They wanted to introduce a play facility into the market square that could be for community events but have the flexibility to remove it and store safely when not in use.
A pilot trial of the Snug play equipment in 2011 highlighted how successful the kit could be for Neston’s market square. Zaria Shreef, Project Manager at the CAN Group says: “I have been amazed at how children respond to the Snug play equipment. The colours, shapes and freeform design of the kit seem to be perfectly designed to appeal to young imaginations. Sometimes children need to be shown that they can move equipment however they want, but once they understand this there’s no limit to what they create – a giant turtle, a pirate ship, a desert island – it’s
constantly surprising. The opportunities for teamwork and co-operation are also great, even among children who’ve never met before. It’s a great resource for conducting surveys because you have a captive audience with the parents as their
children play.”
A survey was carried out with parents as children played with the trial kit and provided good evidence for an application for Rural Support Programme funding to enable the purchase of Snug. The Rural Support fund provided half of the money, with the other half for the Snug kit coming from the Section 106 money. Further funding for the CAN Group to manage the kit came from Neston Town Council.
Snug has been used at various events to provide a safe, free play event. The CAN Group also use the kit on Saturdays on Neston market square so shoppers and their families can enjoy a free play facility. Volunteers help to set up and pack away the kit, which is stored in the council offices and the use of the kit to provide play is combined with raising awareness of local community events and to conduct surveys into local matters. (www.snugplay.co.uk)
Healthy, equal, resilient and thus liveable municipalities are characterised by the fact that health concerns such as rest, recreation, well-being, physical activity, stress management and relaxation have a ...
For many years, the city of Hildesheim has received subsidies from the federal government and the state through the urban development funding programme, thus contributing significantly to the implementation of ...
In der vom Bundesinstitut für Bau-, Stadt- und Raumforschung (BBSR) durchgeführten Modellvorhabenforschung des experimentellen Wohnungs- und Städtebaus (ExWoSt) konnten viele...
"We have the church - do you have ideas?" This question was the starting point for the open participatory process at the St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Stuttgart in May 2017. Visitors, citizens and parishioners were...
Climate-friendly urban development and climate-protection-oriented building design can produce oxygen and improve air quality at various levels. Energy saving in buildings has...
