PLAYGROUNDS IN PARKS 



easj' to find areas suitable for new parks when the purehase price is 

 available, and indubitably it is the free land rather than the park land 

 which causes playgrounds to covet park locations. 



The requisites of an area suitable for playgrounds are but two, 

 anipleness and shade. Even these factors are not as important as one 

 would think, for shade can be provided by inexpensive shelters and 

 the largest playgrounds are not always the most efficient or popular. 

 Landscape planting, such as may exist in coveted park areas, is not 

 essentially an advantage, for with the advent of large numbers of 

 children, the naturalistic beauty of a park is soon worn off like the 

 paint from a new toy. Converting a park into a playground is like 

 changing horses in midstream: the park frequently is lost before the 

 playground is obtained. 



Beauty of natural surroundings is not of special value to a pro- 

 posed playground. In the Washington case already mentioned, the 

 section of park allotted eventually to the playground was an area con- 

 sidered previously the least desirable due to the nearness of a railroad 

 yard, necessarily noisy and unsightly. This area for playground pur- 

 poses, however, satisfied all requirements. It may be stated positively, 

 therefore, that areas of scenic or landscape beauty are in that respect 

 wasted when given over to playgrounds ; and it may also be stated that 

 if a park rib must be sacrificed for the creation of a playground, the 

 poorest rib will do. 



PERMISSIBLE IN LARGE PARKS 



While playgrounds in small parks are a devastation and a sacrilege, 

 playgrounds in parks of amj^le area are not necessarily so, provided 

 the condition be inexorably imposed that the playgroimds shall not 

 trespass beyond certain defined limits and shall })e installed according 

 to a fixed design acceptable to the park. They should never be allowed 

 to edge their way in, for that will mean the development of conditions 



154 



