An innovative new play space in Devonport, Plymouth, is helping to inject a new lease of life into an attractive but once under-used historic city park. Following a detailed consultation process with local stakeholders, the landscape team from Atkins has created a natural play area that is attracting families and inspiring young people from across the city.
Figures show that use of the play area is up from 3 per cent to more than 13 per cent since it opened in September 2009, says Chris Coldwell, Senior Project Manager, Plymouth City Council. ‘The play area has had a huge impact on how the park is used.’
Recent rises in child obesity rates are one of the many drivers behind new approaches to creating innovative play spaces for young people. Child obesity is a problem in the local Devonport ward, says Coldwell, and was one of the reasons why the council was prepared to champion a creatively-designed, inclusive environment, rooted in extensive community consultation.
‘It’s been a long development process,’ he adds, ‘but we wanted to fulfil the spirit of the funding brief, which was to meet community needs in terms of play, appropriate to the setting of this historic park.’
With funding from a successful Heritage Lottery Fund bid, together with extensive community and stakeholder input, the grade II listed Devonport Park has been revitalised.
A team from Atkins was asked to design an innovative new play space to replace the existing, traditional playground. The design aesthetic of the new playground is based on ideas of nature and active play within dynamic spaces of varying scale and character.
An emphasis has been placed on creating spaces that offer spontaneous and self-motivated play in a safe yet adventurous environment, free of constraint yet also meeting safety standards. The playground offers opportunities to engage with nature using features appealing to the senses: landform and rocks, a sensory garden and a maze.
The need for adventurous play
A recent Government initiative criticised ‘bland and unimaginative environments’ with ‘a lack of attention to design’ as reasons why play spaces fail to attract users. Play experts have claimed that a disproportionate amount of money spent on playgrounds goes on safety surfacing, to the detriment of other facilities, with play spaces ending up formulaic and with an over-preoccupation with safety.
The issue of risk is repeatedly raised. CABE Space research has found that over-sensitivity to risk has stifled the design of rich and stimulating environments. Pressures to minimise risk and liability in the public realm can lead to authorities ‘playing it safe’, resulting in standardised spaces that fail to delight, educate or offer young people the opportunity to meet or socialise, claims the report Living with risk: promoting better public space design. Research studies have documented the benefits that can come from natural play, including for children’s learning, healthy growth and development. Much of the momentum behind natural play design originates in Denmark, Holland and Germany. These countries offer important examples of how to create well-designed, thoughtful play spaces. Many play experts believe that these countries are getting it right primarily because, as with Devonport Park, landscape architects enjoy a much closer involvement in the process.
The Government plans, in future, to assess local authority performance on play by introducing a play indicator — NI199 — in 2009/10. This means that every year, children and young people will be asked how satisfied they are with their local play areas and parks. This underlines the importance of consultation for play and the need to engage with the community in a realistic and meaningful way.
Freeform play
Atkins’ starting point for the design was a holistic look at the site, says landscape architect Katie Dugdill, leader of the play area team. The site falls steeply from north to south, posing a potential problem with providing level areas for play structures, but offering opportunities to create sinuous banks and curved mounds for freeform play activities. The playground provides clear learning zones yet creates a continuous, site-specific and seamless layout, relating closely to local landform and mature trees as well as responding sensitively to its historic setting.
‘The emphasis has been placed on creating spaces that offer spontaneous, self-motivated play in an adventurous environment, free of constraint yet meeting safety standards’ says Dugdill.
‘We based the design on a combination of prescriptive play and freeform experimentation so that young people can come up with their own ideas about what the site means. The site constraints, a long 10m slope, helped us to manipulate the landform,’ she says. ‘We were able to pull and push the earth to mould shape and contour, creating a setting for a mixture of natural play features that encourage imagination.’ The client knew that they were looking for a design based on current ideas of natural play, says Dugdill, but design for play in the public realm is fairly loosely defined,
so Atkins was able to take a lead on developing ideas, based on the brief from community consultation.
‘It’s not possible to simply create a playground of boulders and pieces of timber. We needed to build in elements that promote skills such as balancing, swinging and climbing, and which challenge young people physically and build confidence.’
A team pod provides seating and a focal point for ‘older’ young people, although none of the design features are prescriptive. ‘The design is intended to be inclusive for all, but children of specific ages will hopefully be attracted to the features that have been designed for them,’ says Dugdill. ‘Play is also about social learning: learning to share and queue and wait. It’s about testing boundaries, and our design works to enable this range of interpretation.’
Much of the naturally-focused play equipment originates with European makers; in this case Timberplay. ‘We were looking for a more natural aesthetic, as opposed to hard urban bright metal and colourful plastic.’ Maintenance constraints have meant that a few metal elements were introduced, as metal play elements were seen by the local parks department as easier to maintain and less of a fire risk.
Life and activity
The play area is already attracting new users to the park and, with more people around, there is more life and activity, and therefore increased natural surveillance. The original playground was hidden away behind rose gardens, which didn’t help to encourage users. The mature trees dotted across the site do cast shadow, says Dugdill, but also produce a natural backdrop that helps to integrate the play features into the larger park.
Fencing has been kept low to avoid creating a visual barrier, and at each access gate Atkins has designed paved pods with benches and bins, providing convenient areas for families and carers to sit and relax. Pedestrian and bicycle routes to the play area are clear and direct. The playground sits within an existing network of clearly delineated, well-used and well- maintained pathways. Bicycle parking has been conveniently placed close to the southern end of the main play area.
Accessibility to the new play area is a key issue, not only due to the importance of play for children with disabilities, but because it teaches able-bodied children tolerance and empathy. The playground has been designed with several types of ground-level play and with many possibilities for interaction, on and off the equipment, for children of all abilities. Around the playground, adjacent open grassed areas provide an environment for exploratory play.
Research suggests that only 4 per cent of children with disabilities are wheelchair- bound and therefore not all play equipment needs to be useable by those children. This scheme enhances their play experience by utilising pieces that have a sensory appeal including the Phones in Concrete feature, which can also appeal to the visually impaired. The design also includes a small wheelchair carousel and nest swing that can be used by all.
A collective adventure takes shape
The design for Devonport Playground represents an adventure story in landscape form: an evolution from toddler to teen across the site. The catalyst for the development of this creative design was an extensive community consultation process, involving hands-on events to create temporary playscapes from low-cost materials in order to develop ideas. Evidence suggests that engaging young people in creating their own spaces and testing their own risks can lead to ownership and responsibility. Encouraging the exploration of new ideas is also successful with adults, and Bristol-based TouchWood Community Consultation Experts worked for months to resolve a range of differing stakeholder expectations, involving a number of local representatives from Plymouth City Council, The Friends of Devonport Park and young people from local schools and community groups.
The historic nature of the park, which is home to several world war two bunkers, led some members of the local community to question its suitability as a playground site. Yet on opening in September 2009, with 3-4,000 people attending the opening event from across Plymouth, the sensitively designed and sited play area has proven hugely popular with families. ‘Atkins work,’ according to local councillor Michael Leaves, ‘received praise from across the Council and Friends of the Park and other partners for its imagination and ability to translate community aspirations into plans.’ Sensitive to community feeling, Atkins carefully placed the playground design with respect for the existing environment, with tree planting kept to a minimum as the site already contains a number of mature trees, including a tree avenue to the western border of the main play area. Says Chris Coldwell, Plymouth City Council: ‘The design of the playground is extremely imaginative and a creative way of integrating the playground into its historic setting. It blends with the landscape.’
‘As a designer, says Dugdill, the best outcome is to see your designs in use. On the opening day, it was great to see that young people were all over the play features like ants. For me, the success of this project has been working with a client that was willing to take a leap of faith in creating memorable play for kids.’ In the words of Plymouth’s deputy mayor: ‘It’s a wonderful playground. It will encourage people to use the park and establish the happy memories of playing that we have ourselves as adults.’
Juliana O’Rourke spoke to Katie Dugdill, Atkins, and Chris Coldwell, Plymouth City Council
