YOUR FORUM FOR PLAY, SPORTS UND LEISURE AREAS
The town of Waiblingen boasts over a total of 88 playgrounds, as well as over seventeen football areas, two skating areas and seven beach volley ball areas. From a purely mathematical calculation, each child has a playground area of 16.3 m². That’s a lot. However, each lonely little chute or swing has been documented, qualifies Wolfram Koch from the Green Areas Department. The quantity by no means represents the same quality everywhere. Twenty-four playgrounds are now provisionally on the cross-off list drawn up by the admin department because either the equipment is inadequate or no one uses it.
The town has created a play space expansion plan which is to be implemented in the next three years. This as-built plan and survey map includes location, accessibility and the fulfilment of demand of playgrounds. “Important for the evaluation of the locations is also the comparison with the children who live in the surrounding area and their age structure – the demographic development,” explains the Parks and Gardens Department in their local council guidelines. Potential user numbers of the individual playground locations were up and a playground assessment with photographic documentation was created. The acquired data is then supposed to be entered into a playground land register and be published on the Geoportal of the town.
The planning process is supposed to provide details on the need or potential for play areas.
“Because of a focus on central and important playground locations, the protection of the quality of these locations is supposed to be guaranteed, on one hand, and, on the other hand, an efficient allocation of resources with regards playground cleaning, playground checks and the maintenance of playgrounds can be achieved through relinquishing unattractive areas altogether,” argues Wolfram Koch from the Department of Green Spaces.
Playgrounds which are hardly used – where there are more attractive alternatives nearby, where there is not enough space or where equipment is inadequate – should be sifted out. Most of these playgrounds should be knocked down, but kept as green areas. However, on the whole, the town is well stocked with playgrounds, as established in the investigation. Over a large area the core town has playgrounds and football areas as well as trend sport areas for skaters and beach volleyball players. Deficits were found in the areas of Ameisenbühl and Winnender Strasse/Korber Strasse. Frequently, there are overlaps of catchment areas. Also, the small towns are mostly well equipped with play area options. However, there are some gaps – such as in Neustadt in the older district area. Furthermore, there is only a football area in Bittenfeld. Options for trend sports have been completely lacking up to now. With the new play area expansion plan, a means-tested plan is to be facilitated. For the town it is about using the funds economically and, at the same time, providing options for play and exercise area-wide in the residential districts.
In addition, the town estimates that after the re-structuring they will be able to save about 50,000 EUR per annum. Up to now, 300,000 EUR per year has had to be shelled out for maintenance, care, cleaning and checks.
(Stuttgarter Zeitung, 16 August 2010)
Elsabe / photocase.com
