Play Areas for 8 to 13 year olds

Posted By: Wera Hobhouse
Date Posted: 10/06/2009

A bit over the 12 months ago the council celebrated the good news that the Youth Service had attracted over £2m worth of funding from government to provide play areas in the borough. The pot of funding is called ‘Play Pathfinder’ and the extra money was seen as a welcome boost to provide much needed facilities for 8 – 13 year old children. £800,000 goes to Falinge Park for a Disneyland-type adventure playground in the trees. The rest of the funds are being spent new play areas across the borough costing on average £50,000 each. That means either one or two new 8-13 play areas in each ward.

I have been involved in this issue for several months now and with some depressing regularity we come up against the same problem. Residents welcome the principle of more play facilities but as soon as we make a concrete proposal in a particular area the immediate residents are violently opposed to it. Reasons for objection range from fear of antisocial behaviour to parking and litter. When I confront people with the fact that if a certain facility is not acceptable in a certain area, then there would be none at all, they become uncomfortable.

One of the major problems is that the Council only consults residents within the immediate vicinity.

If we left local decisions exclusively to the households next door, we misunderstand what living in a community means.

Is democracy listening only to the people who are directly affected or is democracy about the wider interests of the community?