I don't know what's happening in the rest of the world, but in New York, the playgrounds have all gotten an upgrade in the past year (or so) which makes them far more advanced than the playgrounds I remember as a kid. This means a few things.
The first being that I would like to play on them.
I know I'm supposed to be an adult and sit quietly on a bench while monitoring my child in the sandbox. I also know that when I follow Mazzy up a playground apparatus and she exits using the (very-fun-looking) spiral slide, I am supposed to turn around and use the stairs back whence I came.
But when I see something like the DOME in Union Square Park (pictured above), it takes all the willpower I can muster not to drop the diaper bag, ditch Mazzy in an infant swing and climb the thing myself.
The other observation I've made about the new-fangled playgrounds and their unidentifiable playing structures is that the lure of the equipment coincides with the degree of danger.
For instance, I made the mistake of standing on an irresistible looking contraption in the newly designed playground in Southampton. The thing started spinning so quickly that I'm not sure if my head exploded before or after I was flung to the ground. (I found a video of the "Death Spiral" here.)
Also, the Union Square DOME was closed briefly last year when they found it has the ability to melt your childrens' hands and asses under the scorching hot sun. (It now has a permanent awning over it.)
Add all these factors together (more fun + more dangerous + less supervision due to parents abandoning their children in order to climb the totally-awesome-looking jungle gym rock wall) and I think someone might have it in for our kids.
Think about this— everything child-related has been massively massively researched. Why do you think your kids react to the absence of Elmo like you took away their crackpipe?
Perhaps, I'm watching a bit too much FRINGE but I think there may be an underground ring of child-hating playground developers trying to wipe the earth clean of anyone under twelve. Don't believe me?
Watch this video.
Is it just me or do you totally want to try that thing?
What is the deal with the parks in your area? I wouldn’t take my kids to play at any of those. They sound/look like death traps.
OMG that thing in the video!!! It will toddlers clear from Manhattan to Brooklyn!
Everything looks dangerous in a playground to me now, since the Monkey is basically a squirt, half my height. I don’t want to be a helicopter mom!
What kind of playground is that?! Everything looks scary to me now, but that spinning thing? OMG!
I am with you on the conspiracy theory, or perhaps it is the folks who build playgrounds don’t have children. It never ceases to amaze me how hot the equipment gets. I live in the south and we have a great park nearby, but children will need to wear oven mitts to play on it in the summer. They actually clear-cut the area for the playground – removing huge trees that provided wonderful shade. Idiots.
Oh my goodness, these must be the same equipment the government uses to torture supposed “terrorists” to confessing stuff they didn’t do. Not meant for children at all (unless you’re a child “terrorist”).
I feel awful…I am dying laughing at that poor kid. In my defense I gasped first and was like “OMG!” but then I couldn’t hold in the laughter and forwarded it to my hubs…
oh my word that thing!!!! it FLUNG the kid. HARD. i’m crying from laughing so hard (of course it were my kid though, i’d be pissed, heh)
Playground equipment does not need to be any more dangerous than it already is. Every single scar I have on my body (and the one broken bone I ever had) was caused by a different piece of playground equipment.
What the hell with that last thing? Who thought of that?!
when my oldest was six or just turned seven, we went to a death-playground! I started helicopter parenting, then backed off … my husband took his supervisory turn while I was with the baby, and I told him to quit hovering. She then went on what can only be described as a mini zipline, and when it stopped halfway through started to swing her legs for momentum. Midswing her hands slipped … my nonhovering husband was too far to catch her … and ’til the day I die, I will never forget her piercing scream when she hit the ground. Nor will I forget the guilt I felt for not having her better supervised. It is one thing to let them play on normal swings and slides unattended, quite another to have them on equptment you almost need a license to operate! (p.s. we were lucky – by Grace no broken bones but severely bruised tailbone!)
Anna is more likely going to be injured by my own negligence and her innate gracelessness than any evil playground equipment. But how did no one realize that dome would fry flank steaks in the hot sun? I have the same impulses as you when Anna goes to gymnastics – if they put foam pits and trampolines in the Boston Sports Clubs, I bet their membership would quintuple.
i love nyc playgrounds. but less so when enterprising tots add water to the already fast slides/steep stairs, etc.
also – you must really love the parks with sand. it’s like the beach comes to you!
Mazzy is fearless too. Runs right up the highest slides and the biggest kids. I’m in trouble.
All the jungle gyms have these big open gaps in the railing in case a kid would like to throw themselves off. It takes two people to watch Mazzy on those things. One right on top of her on the piece of equipment and one on the ground.
I don’t know where the video took place but that playground is in Union Square. There’s a kiddie section and a bigger kid section but you just try keeping my kid contained.
They had similar domes in a park in Brooklyn that they had removed because kids actually got burns from them. I’m sure that was a fun summer day!
I’ve heard there are many underground child “terrorists”. They put them on planes to torture fellow passengers with crying and seat-kicking.
I was relieved to see the kid get up and walk it off at the end. I wouldn’t have posted it otherwise!
I’m telling you- something similar happened to me on “the death spiral”. Did you check out the video yet?
I have a scar on my chin from someone pushing me headfirst down a slide in nursery school. I remember, it all happened so fast that I couldn’t get my arms in front of my face to stop me from face planting on the cement at the end.
At least they make the new playgrounds with that soft foam material on the ground.
That’s horrible, I’m sorry. But I’m sure it happens to every parent at some point.
My hovering has equal parts to do with the fear of Mazzy getting hurt and the fear that she will be taken by some kind of child predator. It is NYC after all.
I think they also had to close the DOME in the winter because they realized a thin sheet of ice made it both more fun AND more prone to send your child to the hospital.
One day we’ll get together, lock our kids in the car, and jump on a trampoline until our hearts’ content.
You, my friend, are the becoming the master of tying my posts together. (I love you for it.)
Also, the parents who let their kids run around barefoot in the Tompkins Square park baffle me. I don’t want to be judgmental but how is that different than being barefoot on a city street?
I am the least germaphobic person on earth so I can’t be alone in this.
You want a conspiracy? Whatever happened to see saws? I haven’t seen a proper one in years – you know, the kind that allows siblings to get a taste of power tripping by sitting on the bottom, leaving their partner dangling precariously in the air, only to get up suddenly and send them crashing to the ground. Such fun.
These new-fangled playgrounds are popping up everywhere – I’ve seen them in Sydney and L.A. too.
I’m not even joking when I tell you that the death spiral video might be from Serbia. I went there with my family to see in-laws last year and the parks had WOODEN slides! Like, splintery! I suspect it won’t end until we see a teatherball pole made with a cannonball…
oh my goodness! that thing is horrible! it does seem like it could be fun if you could manage to hang on. side note, cracking up about Elmo! My son loses his baby marbles if Elmo disappears!
Um, okay I totally would be super all over my kid in this setting, not going to lie. But I would have to own up to wanting to go play on these things myself. It should be like the pool! You know- Adult swim! Awesome.
The death spiral looks fun! I’d probably be hurled to the ground too! And that last thing? The yardage that kid got? Shouldn’t they have thought about that and made the sand or whatever go a few feet further? Because it kinda looks like he hit pavement to me. Remember the merry-go-rounds? An older kid would spin you around until you cried or were flung off. I miss that. And I only broke my arm on one of those once. Totally safe.
I have a matching scar!
(Except, now that I think of it, my scar was actually the work of a Jem and the Holograms neon pink/green roadster. Bad. Ass.)
OMG I just screamed out loud. That is crazy! My son wants to try it. I’m gonna take a rain check.
That thing in the video looks AWESOME.
And I totally try out all the stuff on the playground with T. He’s not the only one allowed to have (possibly dangerous) fun!
I personally love the concept of Union Square having that giant dome i affectionately refer to as Mt. WristBreaker. I think too many playgrounds are too sanitized and traditional. Then again, maybe that’s why I have a debit account at Tisch Hospital. However, even I draw the line at the Scarlet Arm Dislocator.
The feeling of the ground reverberating up from your ass through your whole body when someone gives you the shaft on the see-saw is a childhood rite of passage. So sad that kids these days will miss out.
Wooden slides sound tragic. But I assure you, that death spiral is right here in Southampton— I have been knocked from it myself.
Note: death spiral does not reference above video, it references the link in the middle of the post: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdbZpw4oiCE&feature=player_embedded#at=42
You have no idea of the Elmo-induced tantrums I have witnessed. It is a terrifying obsession that only results in more and more Elmo. Mazzy no longer content to just watch Elmo on TV, she must also watch him on the iPad at the same time.
BABY CRACK I tell you.
YES!!!! I was wanted to articulate the adult swim idea in my post but couldn’t find the right words.
The death spiral goes much faster than it looks in that video. Of course, the speed might have something to do with me being much larger than the intended user. Center of gravity and all that.
Those merry-go-rounds were awesome. Running as fast as you could spinning the thing and then jumping on. Weren’t those outlawed too?
My only objection to Mt. Wrist Breaker (besides the wrist breaking and the hand scorching) is that the other adults would judge me for trying to climb it.
My husband and I always talk about this, you never see see-saws anywhere anymore. Nor do you see those merry go rounds where the kids stand and hang onto the rails for dear life while other (usually bigger) kids try to spin them around so fast they fall off. We had both of those in my elementary school playground with pavement underneath! Of course I am dating myself with that comment.
However that video of the worst playground equipment every comes pretty close to the merry go rounds of my youth.
I don’t understand how you can be an industrial engineer with a college degree and design a shiny metal dome in a no-shade playground and not realize the surface will rise to 1,000-degrees in the summer. You’re right. It must be a conspiracy! No one is that stupid.
That piece of equipment in the video looks like an instrument of decapitation.
Seriously.
(p.s. I love Fringe. And my children. So they won’t be going near that playground…)
ah yes the barefoot kids, and also the only-clad-in-a-diaper children in the spray parks. gotta love new york!
Why is everything metal now? And was that concrete it flung them to? Put giant mats down at least. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, DEATH TRAPS.
I’m in NJ and I’ve found the opposite to be true- everything is made of foam and shit. All the fun, dangerous stuff from my youth is gone- remember those giant metal merry-go-rounds? Those were the shit… I actually didn’t bother to resist the urge to play on one when I was visiting Peru and found one at the zoo. I made my husband push it and everything. Also, everything I see now is made of plastic. What fun is it if you don’t have to worry about getting a splinter? And what ever happened to tire swings? Playgrounds today are breeding our children to be pussies. Apparently I need to cross the river and play on your side!
Hahaha! I can’t wait until my fiance gets home so I can show him that video. That was hilarious. They could at least stretch the sand out further so there’s less risk of skinned knees.
Also, “I am supposed to turn around and use the stairs back whence I came.” Oops. My bad. I’ve been going down the slide for the last two years haha.
Seriously? Someone placed a shiny aluminum orb outdoors on a playground directly under the hot sun and DIDN’T muse to themselves, “You know, this might get hot and burn children. Perhaps we should re-think this idea and/or add some sort of cooling apparatus to it.” What a bunch of assclowns.
And I’m with you – I totally want to play on the playground too. In fact, I don’t turn around and go back down the stairs from whence I came after Lil’ Bit goes down the slide – I follow her! Yeah. I’m that mom.
Talk to Michael Van Valkenburgh— Union Square DOME designer. I’m sure he’d love to hear from you.
Heidi David (Madame Paradox) turned me on to Fringe. I am only 3/4 of the way through the first season but I am officially obsessed.
Take a trip to my neck of the woods. We’ve got tire swings all over the place.
Also, I’m so sad that Mazzy won’t get to experience a thick shard of wood in her finger. Those were the days.
I know I’m SUPPOSED to do that but that doesn’t mean I don’t use the slide from time to time. I just try my best to look like I’m not enjoying it that much.
(wheeeeeee!!!!!)
I live right down the block from this monstrosity and can say that although i have no children of my own, my mough is agape every time i walk past, imagining my own children running around all over this evil death trap of a playground. The whole time i’m watching i’m number 1 looking for Little Vic, and number 2 waiting for another onlooker to agree with me on how scary the whole NY “playground” situation really is. But that’s just me 🙂