The World is Changing. So Are Playgrounds.

This is your biweekly dose of playground knowledge from someone who's spent 20 years inspecting them.

In this issue, I’ll talk about the importance of proactive risk planning and how it can mitigate playground injuries.

I’ll also discuss how I expect the ongoing Iran War to impact the price you pay for a new playground.

All that and more lies ahead in The Playground Post.

People tend to think of playgrounds as institutions or pillars of a community, but they don’t exist in a vacuum. Seasons change, kids come and go, new equipment gets installed, and all the while, playgrounds become different than they once were.

Sometimes this is for the better; I’ve been part of more playground upgrades and refurbishments than I can count, and the way they bring new life to an old space is something special.

But other times, playgrounds change for the worse. Everyone has seen dilapidated, unused playgrounds that serve more as eyesores than sources of fun, but even newer-looking playgrounds carry risks if left neglected. I’d argue that a playground installed within the past year has the potential to be just as dangerous as one installed in the 1970s, and in either case, the root cause of the danger is neglect.

For this reason, it’s crucial to understand how quickly the safety of a playground can change for the worse. For instance, imagine you replenish your playground’s rubber mulch surfacing, and a couple months go by. A child falls from a play structure deck, they suffer a fall and injure themselves due to insufficient surfacing depth.

If you’re confused as to how this could happen, you shouldn’t be. When it comes to playgrounds, two months is a long time, and all sorts of factors (e.g. kids landing in a similar area and reducing surfacing depth, inclement weather blowing it away, etc.) can contribute to making parts of a playground less safe.

Don’t just assume that a one-size-fits-all approach to playground maintenance will work for your space. Don’t just take it at face value when people tell you “Replenish your surfacing every month and you’re good to go.”

Get ahold of a CPSI, analyze your space, and decide on a maintenance cadence that suits your playground and the kids who use it.

Heavy rainfall poured into the Midwest last week, with extensive flooding in states like Indiana and Ohio. If flood waters breach your playground, it’s important to examine your playground after the fact and take note of a few areas, including:

In short, torrential downpours won’t wash playgrounds away, but they do demand that you take a closer look at your space to ensure its safety.

A few issues ago, I wrote about the impact of the Iran War on playground prices. Factors like volatile fuel prices, unpredictable availability and pricing of high-density polyethylene (or HDPE), and general transcontinental shipping issues have led to some playground companies increasing prices.

It’s easy to see the correlation between gas prices and playground prices; after all, most playgrounds are shipped via freight trucks, which need diesel fuel to get to where they’re going, and if the price of diesel goes up, companies have to make up the cost somewhere. In most cases, companies have implemented a fuel surcharge or other, similar fees.

However, what may not be as clear is how HDPE prices could affect the price of playground equipment going forward. HDPE is present on just about every playground in some way or another. Tunnels, activity panels, and slides are just a few examples of equipment that’s made using molded HDPE.

Since June, North American polyethylene prices have fallen sharply, down about 15 cents per pound.

If you're wondering why your playground quote hasn’t reacted to the sharp increase and subsequent decrease in HDPE cost, the answer is timing. Playgrounds aren’t as reactive to global events as, say, crude oil, so it makes sense that equipment prices haven’t drastically changed in the same way gas has.

That said, I’m wondering two things right now:

I don’t know that anyone has a great answer to those questions right now, but my educated guess is that playground prices will eventually reflect the volatility caused by the Iran War. Sure, domestic supplies of HDPE have kept the price low for now, but those won’t last forever as other countries buy US exports.

This is all fairly complex, but here’s the bottom line: If it were me, I’d think about making that new playground purchase sooner rather than later.

The case for moving sooner on your playground purchase isn't that prices are currently spiking. They aren’t. The case for buying now is that global market conditions could create a scenario where HDPE prices, and playground equipment along with it, start spiking without warning.

If you’re looking to purchase a playground, ask yourself:

These are the sorts of questions that sometimes prove necessary to make playground plans come to life.

If you have any questions on how to get your playground to the finish line, reply to this email and I’ll give you my take.

A playground is a big purchase, and when it comes to completing a project, there’s no such thing as a dumb question.

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Talk soon,

Nic Breedlove

Certified Playground Safety Inspector

20 years in the game. Still learning.