1. The Effect of
Risk Aversion on
U.S. Public Playground
Form and Policy
Shannon MIKO Mikus

2. 1. Introduction
2. Children’s Need for Play
2.1 Play and Health
2.2 Risk and Play
2.3 Play Value
3. Risk Aversion
3.1 Playgrounds & the Courts
3.2 The CPSC & ASTM
3.3 Is the CPSC the Right Place for Play?
4. Playground Design Changes Over Time
4.1 Decreasing Play Value
4.2 Popular Playgrounds Today
5. Conclusion
6. Appendix
Table I: Play Value Aspects, By Author
Table II: Playground Aspects That Add Play Value
Suggestions for Further Reading
Notes
3
5
10
26
28
19
TABLE OF CONTENTS
APPRECIATION
This publication is possible thanks to the generosity and vision of Julian
Richter, Sr. and Peter Heuken (Richter Spielgeräte), the management acumen
and precious time of Robin Meyer and her colleagues (APE), the tenacity of
Dr. Sungkyung Lee (UGA), and generous amounts of tolerance and love from
Drue, Tanner, Sage, and Lagan (Mikus Family). Thanks also to the industry
professionals who recognize what needs to be done, and do so. Everything
worthwhile has risk.
RESEARCH BASIS
For a more in-depth look at any of the information presented in this
publication, please see my 2014 Masters Thesis completed at the University of
Georgia, College of Environment and Design, “Risk aversion and the Consumer
Product Safety Commission’s effect on American playground design,” directed
by Dr. Sungkyung Lee. The thesis asked which social aspects and factors had
affected playground design over time, utilizing the idea of play value as a metric
to establish playground efficacy by comparing playground form over time. Play
value features from leading authors were used to create a play value scorecard
and images of playgrounds over time were rated and compared. The data showed
a general decrease in play value from past to present. In my thesis I argue that
the roots of the decline in play value include misunderstanding the differences
between risk and danger, a legal system designed only to find fault, risk averse
attitude, and lack of national play strategy. The thesis is in the public domain at:
https://gradschoolforms.webapps.uga.edu/system/attachments/21032/
Shannon_Mikus_Jerome_20147_MLA.pdf?1406034464
The thoughts and opinions expressed are solely those of the author and
do not reflect the ideas or opinions of Architectural Playground Equipment,
Richter Spielgeräte, The ASLA, The US Air Force, The University of Georgia,
or any other substantial organization.
THE EFFECT OF RISK AVERSION
ON U.S. PUBLIC PLAYGROUND
FORM AND POLICY
Shannon MIKO Mikus
Student ASLA, LEED Green Associate, MLA, USAF (Retired)

3. 2 3
1. Introduction
Properly designed playgrounds create excitement and attract families and
children from far away. Yet American play spaces have taken on a sameness
and tameness that fails to engage users. A unique American attitude toward
risk and child development, the prioritization of risk elimination over true
provision of play value, inhibits healthy play. Despite research that play is
essential to proper child development and that risk is essential to proper
play,2
risk-averse adults routinely justify removing swing sets, slides, and
climbers from playgrounds, and sealing the ground in uninteresting rubber.3
The result? American children are not only losing properly equipped play
spaces, they are spending less time engaged in outside free play, altogether.
Across the nation, it is more common to find actions against play than
for it, enabling a play deficit. Chicago school students had a “no recess”
policy from 1998 until 2012. According to administrators, recess needed to
be eliminated from the daily lives of the children under their care because
of, “... academic pressures…a fear of lawsuits if children become injured,
a concern about the possibility of unsavory adults lurking at the edges of
playgrounds and a shortage of teachers and volunteers willing to supervise
the children”.4
Photo © Mary Noble Ours
ABSTRACT
A dominant cultural and institutional aversion to risky elements in
playgrounds currently undermines American children’s opportunity for
proper physical, mental, and emotional development. Playgrounds that are
too safe are not suitable places for children to gain the wide spectrum of
experiences they need for proper and full development.1
As adults who seek
to provide a proper upbringing for children, whether as parents or designers,
confusing risk and danger and seeking to eliminate both does our children
no service.
In this paper I demonstrate the fundamental value of risk in play; outline
key legal and political trends leading to our current risk-averse view of
play; analyze changes in playground form to reveal a pattern of decreasing
play value over time; and present examples of contemporary play designs
that challenge this pattern. I conclude by arguing that adopting a National
Play Policy that recognizes risk’s benefits and is based on risk management,
rather than risk aversion, is essential to ensuring that American children
develop proper physical, mental, and social skills.
This paper is intended to give designers and play providers a proposed
pathway toward rectifying the current play deficit in America. The brief
perspective and problem identification will support the logic of pursuing
more risk in playgrounds.
“Always do what you are afraid to do.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson

4. 4
Play in America is an emotional topic, resolved too often without due
regard for the value of risk and how it is different from danger.
In this paper I present the value of risk in play, to differentiate risk from
danger. I present risk as the foundational element of play to show designers
and citizens that creating effective play spaces involves designing and
accepting risk, safely, while avoiding danger. In the chapters that follow, I
first introduce the necessity of play for healthy development and show how
risk is essential for play by creating play value. I then show how risk aversion
is perpetuated in the current legal paradigm, degrading play value without
enhancing safety or reducing injury. Finally, I present examples of risky,
successful, safe, playgrounds and risk-management-focused play strategies
from overseas. These international examples serve as successful models for a
future National Play Policy. Ultimately, establishing a new understanding of
the relationships between risk, play value, and safety will improve
playgrounds and encourage design that is beneficial to children’s health,
incorporates varying levels of risk, offers high play value, and eliminates
danger on the playground.
Accepting risk in play or adhering to questionable standards makes tremendous difference in
a child’s life. Fairfax, VA, (above) and Beauvoir School (previous page) have adopted differing
stances on risk. Photo © kaBoom.org
5
2. Children’s Need for Play
Play, as defined in the frequently-cited UK Playwork Principles, “is a
process that is freely chosen, personally directed and intrinsically motivated.
That is, children and young people determine and control the content and
intent of their play, by following their own instincts, ideas and interests, in
their own way for their own reasons.”5
Play’s vital role in child development
cannot be understated. Play benefits the child’s mind and emotional
development as the foundation for understanding the environment. Physical
play, where large muscle groups are trained and strengthened, is a
motivation that children cannot suppress.6
Engaging their minds and bodies
constructively is about more than relieving a case of fidgeting. Lady Allen of
Hurtwood, English landscape architect and promoter of child welfare, said
that children need a place to develop self-reliance, “so limbs will become
obedient to will.”7
2.1. Play and Health
Play benefits children physically, emotionally, and mentally and the
consequences of play deprivation are serious. Childhood obesity, commonly
linked to an abundance of sedentary leisure time and an absence of physical
play, reached epidemic proportions last decade. Research into childhood
obesity, often a precursor to type II Diabetes, suggests that American
children are not getting enough physical activity in their play.8
Free play is recognized by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP)
for its health and developmental benefits.9
Child development specialists
assert that exercise is critically important and proper free play is the primary
vehicle for that.10
Risky play encourages beneficial physical activity by
involving the whole child as goals are identified, problems are analyzed, and
challenges are overcome.11
Additionally, a lack of proper play is frequently cited in the disturbing
life histories of society’s most harmful people. Dr. Joe L. Frost, an eminent
American play scholar and expert witness for over 100 playground litigation
cases since the 1980s, is explicit about the consequences of growing up
without play:
“ [The] absence of play in supportive, positive contexts can create
violent, antisocial, mentally impaired and emotionally sterile adults.

5. 6
In one study, about 95 percent of the convicted murderers who
were examined reported either the absence of play as children or
illogical, brutal, abnormal play such as bullying, sadism and extreme
teasing. In the same study, around 75 percent of drunk drivers who
were examined reported play abnormalities.”12
Additionally, Phillip K. Howard’s book, Life Without Lawyers, tells how
Dr. Stuart Brown, founder of the National Institute for Play, led the
commission that explored Charles Whitman’s motivations and personal
history that led to his 1966 of murder fourteen people at the University of
Texas. As noted by Howard, “The commission found that ‘his lifelong lack
of play was a key factor in his homicidal actions.’This was also true with
other mass murderers.”13
While the health benefits of play are clear, it is not enough that
playgrounds simply be built. Playgrounds must be designed to present
progressive challenges, provide varying levels of risk, and become a part of
the child’s life because, as former National Recreation and Park Association
president James Peterson notes, “[w]ithout adequate challenge children soon
lose interest and the playground becomes an expensive waste.”14
When not
attracted to built playgrounds, children will find and take risks elsewhere, or
engage in sedentary behaviors. Risk positively affects children’s physical
activity levels, encouraging repeated free play.
2.2. Risk and Play
From the curiosity of investigating a new butterfly or meeting a new
playmate, to learning how to swing on a rope or creating rules for a game, to
flinging oneself across a void to reach the other side, there are many levels of
risk in play. Young humans have learned about their world by confronting
these types of risk through play since the beginning of humanity.15
Children
justify their risk-taking by saying that “it is fun”.16
Children cannot resist
the urge to test themselves against small and large challenges: the tall tower,
the interesting sound, the mysterious maze, the new kid, the funny shapes.
These challenges entice children, draw their interest, and engage their
minds.17
The exhilaration of encountering, confronting, and working
through risky situations is sometimes referred to as “deep play”.18
In proper
amounts, risk not only creates fun but also encourages children’s discovery
7
of courage, power, friendship, self-reliance, and trust.
Risk is a part of any worthy goal, and giving children the appropriate
spaces and situations in which to practice encountering and conquering risk
enriches their childhood and lays the foundation for a successful adult life.
Since the value of goals are usually directly proportional to their risks, that
is the possibility of failure or harm, overcoming more and greater risks to
achieve one’s goals can yield great accomplishment. This outlook of
accepting and managing risk is called risk management. Risk management
is goal-focused. “Children learn risk management strategies for themselves
and [from] their peers as a result of risky play experiences. Observational
studies of children at play found they exposed themselves to risk but
displayed clear strategies for mitigating harm”.19
When afforded the
opportunity to manage risk early in life, risks become something children
learn to recognize, manage, and conquer—critical preparation for avoiding
danger later in life.
Fear, an innate sense that the state or level of risk has changed
dramatically, is important for children to recognize and deal with. Children
may sense fear as they edge near a precipice or feel their footing begin to
fail. Ken Kutska of the International Playground Safety Institute, points out
that this “fear is important” because children asses risk differently and
change their actions when fear is involved.20
Fear, then, can serve to focus
attention and allow children to realize they must be careful and deliberate.
It is in the deliberate coupling of mental and physical activity to assess risk,
work past fear, and complete a goal that optimal fun is experienced.
A safe playground is not one with less risk, but one with fewer injuries.
Research from Europe and the US points out that the riskiest playgrounds
of all, Adventure Playgrounds, have the lowest accident rate among
playgrounds.21
At Adventure Playgrounds, children can build a fire for
warmth or cooking, use hammers and saws, build their own structures, and
take care of themselves and each other amidst the chaos of playing. The
openly present risk in adventure playgrounds heightens children’s attention,
making them more aware of their situation and more deliberate in their
actions; thus the children, themselves, create a safer environment by being
aware of their environment.22
Risks are not synonymous with hazards. Stephen Smith, Associate

6. 8
Professor at Simon Fraser University, says playground risk is a valuable and
pedagogical experience.23
When children encounter risk with a goal in
mind, working through challenges and risks, or finding their own “work
around”, they learn about themselves and the way the world works. In play,
risk is pedagogical and this differentiates it from other risks, like catching
the flu, that they have little opportunity to avoid or learn from.
Dr. Frances Wallach, a member of the first Safety Standards Panel of the
U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission (CPSC) in the 1980s, who
also helped to develop playground safety guidelines, has said that a risk is
something a child either can be aware of, or is aware of, while a hazard puts
one in danger because a condition for injury exists that the user cannot
perceive.24
Risks in play do not necessarily equate to danger because risks
are something children can overcome, avoiding negative outcomes such as
injuries. Risk adds great value to the play environment. Danger, though, has
no place on the playground.
In any discussion of risk management and fear, it is necessary to
remember that perception of risk is highly personal. Adults sense risks and
danger differently than children, and children evaluate risks independently
of their peers (and often independently of how they themselves have
evaluated risk in the past). The most important factor in keeping
playgrounds safe is understanding how children at play regard risk; within
reason, each child must have the freedom to decide how much risk is
enough. Eliminating risky apparatuses deprives children of the opportunity
to learn at their own developmental level. Likewise, when children are
physically moved into places they could not go on their own, like picking a
toddler up and setting them high on a slide or a structure, their capacity for
self-protection is compromised.
It is the playground designer’s responsibility to provide risky situations,
and also make sure that the child can choose the possible courses of action,
accepting challenges or gracefully withdrawing, that suits his or her
individual development. The key is to provide environments with play value
of many kinds and at many levels. The promise of continually progressive
challenges beckons children to return again and again as they develop and
seek to expand their capabilities.
9
2.3. Play Value
As outlined above, play is vital to children’s health and development, and
children engage most deeply in play when they are having fun. Optimal fun
requires the perception of risk and the potential for overcoming one’s
fears.25
The character of play equipment (more appropriately called
“apparatus”) in a play space contributes greatly to the effectiveness of the
space. When a play apparatus does not incorporate risk, it lacks challenge,
fails to generate sufficient fun, and is seldom visited. Risky apparatuses, on
the other hand, specifically designed to entice children to play safely and
develop normally, attract children to play again and again.26
The wobbly
rope bridge is designed to give the child a feeling of accomplishment after
overcoming an initial fear and then having passed over it. Likewise, crossing
a high gap or learning to control fire, without harm, are major
accomplishments.
Play value is a measure of how much play one can get out of something.
Better play value is held by things, places, and spaces that are compelling
and encourage children’s involvement. Interesting and complex places,
changing objects, mutable materials, and objects that children manipulate
have high play value.27
Play value is subjective, but some basic design
principles add play value. Appended Tables I and II compile various play
value aspects, link them to common environmental aspects, and summarize
their value to the child. Though far from exhaustive, the tables serve to
Surprises abound at Belleville Park in Paris. Its complexity creates continuous interest and a
high level of engagement. Photo © landezine

7. 10
show that play value is not a one-size-fits-all, mass production effort.
Drawing the attention of many different children and engaging as many
senses and levels of involvement as possible is the goal. For example,
surprise, the little dose of fear that heightens excitement, adds tremendous
play value; changing and hidden features endear a play environment to the
child as they make “their own” discoveries and their own special memories.
Creating play value involves incorporating risk in play. However, few
American play spaces embody enough risk to offer genuine play value. The
legal reasons for the decline of American play spaces is discussed in the
next section, and later sections will look more closely at the design changes
over time, as well as offer insights on optimizing play value. As risk-averse
apparatuses have became more prevalent, play value, essential for proper
play, has diminished.
3. Risk Aversion
With risks and challenge comes the possibility for failure and harm. The
rise of risk aversion in America was not isolated to playgrounds, but it has
had a detrimental effect on them. This section traces the effects of the rise
of risk aversion on playgrounds over time through examining: the role of
the courts in early playground policy, the effects of strict liability, and the
ramifications of the design suggestions in the CPSC’s Handbook for Public
Playground Safety. This exploration makes evident that the common misuse
and confusion of “risk” and “danger” in application to playgrounds has
provided the impetus for progressive risk aversion among parents, educators,
public officials, and play providers. In presenting a critique of the current
standards, an alternative is also proposed that would facilitate a wider
acceptance of proper playgrounds.
American courts initially protected municipal functions, like the
provision of playgrounds and parks, from torts, and citizens rarely received
injury compensation if cases went to court.28
Thus, there was little incentive
for public entities to scrutinize or change their traditional practices
regarding risk. In a well-meant attempt to protect children from harm on
playgrounds, the CPSC sought to reduce playground injury by reducing
wholesale playground risk. However, this turn to risk-reduction had the
secondary effect of prioritizing the desire for injury-free childhoods over
11
children’s need for risky, effective play.
The current playground safety guidelines, adopted by the CPSC in 1981,
do not recognize the value of risk in play, but rather see all risk strictly as
an element contributing to eventual harm.29
The American legal system
does not recognize risk as a positive, inherent, or essential aspect of play.30
Therefore, American parents, designers, lawyers, playground operators,
insurance providers, and citizens generally misunderstand the role of risk in
play. This incorrectly perceived relationship between safety and risk, where
one must go up in order to drive the other down, ignores the unique setting
that playgrounds are and the value that risk brings to play.
3.1. Playgrounds and the Courts
Today, American law supports the assumption that risks—in playground
equipment and thousands of other products—create danger and therefore
designers who incorporate risk are responsible for injuries. But this was not
always the case. The history of playground litigation in the U.S. provides an
industry-specific view of the effects of a sweeping national trend toward the
legal empowerment of consumers in 20th
Century.
Prior to the 1960s, American courts supported the primacy of municipal
or sovereign immunity, a legal principle that protected government function
from torts. Under this paradigm, injuries sustained in public spaces could
be brought before the court as complaints of “municipal negligence,”
but the results of these early cases—heavily favoring municipalities over
individuals—assert the view that risk was the responsibility of the user to
recognize and avoid.
By the early 1960s and 1970s courts had begun to allow suits that
challenged sovereign immunity. As a result, municipalities sought other
forms of protection from torts, and the target of torts began to shift away
from governments to the manufacturers and distributors of products. When
this change occurred, the law demanded that there be “defect” in products
and that manufacturers become “strictly liable” for their goods, otherwise,
there could be no compensation for injury and death.31
The watershed case for playground manufacturers took place in 1961
concerning a child whose finger was amputated in the rotating crossbars
of his backyard playset’s “Skyrider” swing. McBurnette v. Playground

8. San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Children’s Garden, designed by M. Paul Friedberg and Partners, rates high
in play value because its unique forms not only add height, have varied textures, provide challenges for a
wide range of abilities, as well as sheltered areas, continues to draw and demand attention, and provides
a sense of accomplishment, while creating a sense of place.
Photo © marcouiller.blogspot.com

9. 14
Equipment Co. and Stelbar Cycle Corporation, 130 So Fl 2d 117 (1961)
was argued on the grounds of strict liability and decided in the favor of the
plaintiff, creating a new legal precedent for liability against manufacturers
and distributors. As a result, designers, manufacturers, and distributors
became increasingly wary of what they produced and sold to the public.
Playground manufacturers were confused, though, because with no pre-
existing design standards, they had no idea what the public or the courts
would decide was dangerous.
This shift of legal burden, indeed for recognizing risk and dealing with
risk, from users to manufacturers allowed prosecutors to show that products
inherently designed with “risk” were possibly “dangerous,” and it is in this
shift of logic that the confusion between risk and danger originated.32
Prior to this, court-made playground policy created a legal line between
the concepts of danger and risk. Though the public, through jury decisions,
was finding the government’s “degree of care” insufficient, the courts found
the governments’ care proper and overturned the jury decisions. With
strict liability came the skillful confusion of risk and danger that allowed
compensation to be awarded under a set of laws that did not clarify and
could not deal with the need for risk in playgrounds.
The whale at Plikta Park in Gothenhurg, Sweden provides a most striking example of extreme
play value by deriving local forms very literally. The scale and form demand attention and invite
inspection and discovery by children of many ages and abilities. Photo © blog.homeaway.co.uk
15
TIMELINE OF SELECTED PLAYGROUND LITIGATION
A progressive aversion to playground risk is evident as court decisions become
more frequent and become more favorable to citizens.
1873
1946
1957
1961
1978
1978
1984
2007
2009
Railroad v Stout - US
Supreme Court established
that reasonable care must be
taken to protect children.
Gleason v Pittsburg - Boy falls
from slide and is severely injured
impacting the concrete pad
Cooper v Pittsburgh - Child
injured on swings by twirling
the ropes up and then spinning
them down.
McBurnette v Playground
Co. - Child’s finger amputated
on “Skyrider” swing in his own
backyard.
Clark v Furch - Child is injured
jumping from the top of jungle
gym and parents sue a city
employee (teacher at the school).
CPSC publishes “Handbook for Public Playground Safety”
American insurance premiums
soar as stock market falls.
Billerica, MA - Young girl hit
in head with baseball playing
on a childrens’ play stage near a
ball field.
Quinn v Babylon - Child falls
from trapeze rings at school and
breaks his arm.
-Owners of attractive / hazardous areas must
guard them against children’s curiosity.
-Sets the standard of treatment for children
where play is concerned.
-“Safe” playground surfacing recommended by
APA is not installed widely due to costs.
-Sovereign immunity is upheld.
-Children will sometimes disobey the posted
“rules” of the playground.
-Municipality is not an ensurer of child safety
on its playgrounds.
-Joints and pinch points can cause injury and
are a part of the design.
-Strict liability opens manufacturers to torts
for designs that may cause harm.
-The quality and role of supervision is
questioned.
-Public seeks to have more targets for torts,
and govt’s must seek insurance vs claims.
-Law suit settlements and jury awards
skyrocket in costs, $1Million jury awards
become common.
-Family argues that the ball barier should have
extended farther.
-Court replies that any injury is preventable,
but says that is no basis for defeating sovereign
immunity.
-Mulch bedding depth is not in compliance
with CPSC guidelines.
-CPSC standards set playground suiability :
child has no part in his or her own protection.
Year Case Issues and Social Significance
1981
Pritchette v Manistique
Boy injured by 10 inch wood
splinter on a city owned slide.
-Equipment maintenance is called
into question.
-Failure to properly maintain equipment is
grounds to suspend sovereign immunity.
1972 CPSC formed by Federal Act
1948 Styer vs Reading - Child’s eye is
injured during supervised play at
a city-operated playground
-City undertakes a supervision role, by
providing a play leader and is held t a higher
standard of care.
-Dissenting justice warns: this precedent may
make “marbles” improper play equipment

10. 16
3.2. The CPSC and ASTM
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), the federal agency
charged with “protecting the public from unreasonable risks of injury
or death associated with the use of the thousands of types of consumer
products under the agency’s jurisdiction,”33
is the result of a massive public
outcry in the late 1960s for the Federal government to tackle issues like:
nuclear power, industrial pollution, automobile safety, and workplace health
and safety where the presence of risk indicated danger (an effort famously
led by Ralph Nader and his team of young lawyers, Nader’s Raiders). Today,
the CPSC is a proper home for oversight of products like hair driers, stereo
systems, garden tools, and baby products, where risky design can cause
horrible harm and even death to individuals.
The CPSC’s legitimacy comes from two sources: the scientifically
derived, fact-based ASTM standards, and the threat of expensive litigation.
The CPSC utilizes the scientific expertise of the American Society of
Testing and Materials (ASTM) to create standards for such items like
electrical protection circuits and the minimum material strength in shovels,
shears, and chain saws. Since scientific testing can be readily verified and
repeated, the validity of ASTM standards is not in doubt, and compliance
with them is widely accepted as the keystone method for providing physical
safety to users, especially where mechanical, physical apparatuses are
concerned.
Mobius Climber, Photo © Landscape Structures
17
The creation of the CPSC transferred the informal, though very real,
authority for playground approval from informal organizations of concerned
and learned citizens, (the old Playground Association of America (1900-
1930, which became the Playground and Recreation Association of America
[1930-1963] and finally today’s National Recreation and Parks Association
[founded in 1963]), to a Federal Commission with powers to impose
penalties (through import restrictions and recalls) and recommend design
standards. The publication of the CPSC playground safety guidelines in
1981 placed the federal government in charge of playground acceptability
and was the first step toward standardized design.
Today, ASTM and CPSC are commonly recognized as authoritative
experts on playground safety matters. Dr. Joe Frost claims that CPSC
guidelines have been the “most influential playground safety criteria in
lawsuits.”34
The science of ASTM testing (spelling out the required material
composition and performance parameters of resilient playground surfacing
in ASTM F1292, for example, and defining the maximum/minimum space
allowable between guardrail bars to prevent a child from slipping through
or getting stuck in ASTM F1487), along with the CPSC’s standing as
a Federal Commission, have given these “voluntary” recommendations
the force of legal standards: courts readily accept the recommendations’
scientific standards as valid truth, and both sides of litigation cases now use
the standards as foundational arguments.
3.3. Is the CPSC the Right Place for Play?
The CPSC’s overall mission, successfully applied to so many other
products for American health and safety, is to make products safe and
effective by eliminating their risky aspects. Dangers on playgrounds, like
concrete pads under tall structures, slides that have sharp seams, and wood
that is treated with toxic chemicals, can and should be rectified through
standards. Other aspects of playgrounds, however, which require risk in
many varying degrees and forms to function, present a conundrum for an
organization whose purpose is the elimination of risk.
In the absence of legally accepted design standards that dictate designing
for play value, the CPSC’s safety guidelines have become the primary
measure for acceptably safe playgrounds35
in all respects, with the result

11. 18
being that play-enhancing risk has been designed out of most playgrounds.
Utilizing only engineering specifications that focus solely on limiting a
child’s ability to engage with his/her environment in a “freely chosen,
personally directed and intrinsically motivated” manner has neglected the
vast majority of children who play without injury. In Managing Risks in Play
Provision: Implementation guide, UK play experts David Ball, Tim Gill, and
Bernard Spiegal advise UK play providers that,
“simply reflecting the concerns of the most anxious parents, and
altering playground design in an attempt to remove as much
risk and challenge as possible, prevents providers from offering
important benefits to the vast majority of children and young
people. It may also lead more adventurous children to seek physical
challenges in other, less well-managed environments, while others
settle for sedentary activities.”36
From these authors’ perspective, the CPSC’s emphasis on risk
elimination over risk management on playgrounds not only perpetuates a
general lack of understanding of the role of risk in play, it may, in fact, lead
to physical harm.
Furthering the notion that the CPSC’s goal of risk elimination on
playgrounds should be re-evaluated is the fact that CPSC statistics show
that the accident rate on playgrounds remains steady, despite 35 years
of active risk reduction.37
Underpinning this policy failure is a lack of
robust data concerning the root causes of playground injury. Without a
basic understanding of the fundamental facts regarding playgrounds or
playground injuries, policy decisions have been less than optimal. Below I
highlight two main critiques of this data shortfall; please refer to my thesis
for a more extensive analysis.
The most extensive database utilized by the CPSC, NEISS (National
Electronic Injury Surveillance System), is not robust enough to utilize for
decision-making, yet it is frequently cited in official reports. Sound policy
decisions cannot be made based on NEISS data for two main reasons. First,
the source reliability is questionable because hospital staff who collect the
data are not trained accident investigators. Hospital staff cannot determine,
for example, whether the alleged equipment mentioned by the patient
19
was actually a causal factor in the injury nor determine the condition of
the apparatus. Second, hospital staff have no means to report whether
the equipment involved in the incident was in compliance with standards
(whether CPSC, ASTM, local, or state), and this information is rarely, if
ever, investigated or gathered.38
Moreover, the CPSC cannot officially dictate the adoption of its
suggestions as standards, yet a limited number of states have implemented
various laws, codes, and policies requiring CPSC-compliance on
playgrounds. Many local parks departments and independent play providers
outside of these states still choose to adhere to CPSC guidelines. Play
providers, fearing litigation, act in their best interests.39
Perpetuating fears
of injury and litigation to accomplish the CPSC’s goal of injury-free play
has prompted skyrocketing insurance costs and created a predisposition
to risk-aversion among parents, caretakers, play providers, and apparatus
designers. This risk-averse environment prevents the widespread, proper
application of risk in playgrounds and degrades the utility of the American
play environment.
This hostile legal and financial environment in America conitinues
to erode play value, as American play providers must weigh the costs of
litigation and maintenance against their current fiscal struggles.40
A sound
legal understanding of risk management’s value in play provision, adopted
by the UK’s Play Safety Forum and presented by Ball, Gill, and Spiegal,
would be more effective at helping play providers strike a balance between
the needs of children and fiscal concerns.41
4. Playground Design Changes Over Time
Choosing to focus on eliminating the negative aspects of play while
ignoring the opportunities to enhance play value has resulted in far
more safety than play on American playgrounds, and the goals of play
are not being met. Prior to the 1970s, municipalities built and operated
playgrounds that catered to children’s interest without fear of litigation and
only under the advice of playground consultants or their own budgetary and
philosophical limitations.42
Some early playgrounds contained dangerous
elements, like asphalt, concrete, and protruding metal corners, which have
no place on playgrounds.

12. 20
However, many elements with great play value have been eliminated
from American playgrounds since the creation of the CPSC in 1972, a
trend that has become even more prominent since the publication of the
first edition of the CPSC’s Handbook for Public Playground Safety. (1981).
As identified by playground historian Dr. Susan Solomon, typical “safe”
play environments today “lack most of the important elements necessary for
meaningful play. These include variety, complexity, challenge, risk, flexibility,
and adaptability”.43
The CPSC guidelines advocate eliminating some of the
most attractive elements like loose parts and mutability while ignoring those
elements’ benefits.44
Despite this bleak view, today’s designers and play providers do have a
more precise understanding of the difference between playground risk and
danger. Unfortunately, because there is widespread confusion regarding
risk and danger in American law, proper design remains the exception
rather than the rule. The liability one assumes in creating a playground
will continue to be a barrier to proper design as long as industry guidelines
are supported by laws that conflate risk and danger on playgrounds.
Nevertheless, a balance between risk and safety must be sought. Below,
I review playground design change over time to show how play value
has been reduced as fear of litigation have become the primary tool for
injury reduction. I also show that, despite this trend, some designers and
communities are providing high play value in current playgrounds.
4.1. Decreasing Play Value
Play value is a subjective measure, but some elements which add play
value have measurable aspects. The degree to which height, hardness, and
hinges are used in playgrounds has changed over time, and these elements
can be measured. The overall trend in design for these elements has favored
risk-reduction. Height has generally diminished, and mutability, enabled
through the use of hinges, has mostly disappeared. Trends in hardness
have fluctuated since the 1900s, but a pattern of overall softening has been
evident since the late 1970s, beginning shortly after the CPSC was given
the responsibility of playground equipment safety.
Height adds play value because it can instill fear and awe just by looking
at it. The tall slide or high tower also acts as the signpost for a playground,
21
EARLY PLAYGROUND APPARATUS HEIGHT, 1900-1970
1900
1910
1930
1940
1950
1960
Steel pipe
construction,
over 20 ft high
Boston Playground
Photo: EB Marco
Steel slide
8-10 ft high
School playground
Photo: Pittsburg Pub Lib
Steel pipe
construction,
high swings
10-12 ft high
School playgroud
Photo: Pittsburg
Pub Lib
Tall, open-bottom
merry go round
Photo: Christian
Academy in Japan
Jungle Gym
over 8ft high
Photo: Wayne Miller
Tall iron pipe
jungle gym
Photo: Ministerely
Primary School
Tall slide over 7 ft
height
Photo: Scott on Flickr
Playground with
various height swings
to match
different ages
Photo: Grand
Rapids Pub Lib
Wooden structures over
15 ft high with ropes
and ladders
Bronx girl’s climber
Photo: US Lib of Congress
Flying Dutchman
moves children 3-4 ft
over the ground
Photo: US Lib of Congress
Ladder access to
heights of 18 ft
Dallas Playground
Photo: Dallas Pub Lib

13. 22
attracting children from as far away as they can see it.45
The challenge of
climbing to great heights promises a feeling of accomplishment while
jumping, sliding, or swinging from height creates speed, which is highly
valued. Apparatus with a height of 20 feet were common from the 1900s
until 1930s. Twelve-foot high playground slides and swings were the norm
until the 1960s, but currently, swings are rarely more than 8 feet high and
slides over 6 feet tall are rare. Though some equipment today soars to 12 or
15 feet, this is usually a sun shade or cover and the altitude is not accessible
by children.
Hardness of the surface and apparatuses affects play value by providing
variability and interest to the environment. Playground surfaces, which started
as hard in the 1900s, softened through the 1920s, and then became very hard
in the 1930s and remained so until the 1970s.46
During the reign of Robert
Moses as New York City Parks Commissioner (1934-1964), inexpensive,
maintenance-free playground materials and surfacing – steel, asphalt, and
concrete – became the standard in New York City and were widely accepted
across the nation.47
Surface and apparatus softening became widespread after
implementation of the CPSC Handbook, and continues today.
An increase in high-strength, molded plastic unitary designs, which
serve to remove hazardous seams, has also affected a physical and textural
“softening” of the overall form. But a unitary form can limit the textures of
apparatuses and playing surfaces, thus decreasing their play value. Unitary,
rubberized surfaces became popular as a result of CPSC guidelines seeking
to provide standardized, soft fall zones to prevent skull injuries in the 1990s.
Their value at reducing injuries is in question, and they eliminate changes in
footing that children must recognize and react to as well prevent children
from digging, moving, building or creatively interacting with the ground.
(unlike sand, wood, chips, pea gravel, and other mutable surfaces which
add play value but are not suitable for all types of play). Unitary design in
elevated apparatuses also reduces choice in pathways to use or access the
apparatuses, effectively removing the challenge of choice.
Hinges add mutability that can change apparatus shapes or create
movement in play spaces. Mutability is fascinating to children, so
playground apparatuses that move or change are very enticing and have high
play value.48
However, the possibility for injuries from hinges and rotating
23
surfaces (like those in teeter totters and merry-go-rounds) brought about
their wide removal despite their popularity.
Some mutable apparatuses that have been removed or disappeared are:
The Giant Stride (banned in the 1920s), flying dutchman, swinging gate,
and witches’ hat (removed in the 1930s), tall merry-go-rounds (removed
in the 1950s), teeter-totters (replaced with the spring-mounted riding
apparatus in the 1970s, eliminting the potential harm but limiting the age
range which could benefit from the apparatus to the very young age), and
closed-bottom merry-go-rounds (very rare since the 1980s).
Though height, hardness, and hinges contribute to play value, their
inclusion has decreased markedly as industry and play providers have sought
safety from litigation.
4.2. Popular Playgrounds Today
Comparing the form of play equipment commonly available at schools
and parks to the forms in the most popular playgrounds that Americans
seek to visit reveals a distinct difference between what apparatus is widely
available and what is widely desired. Research into the type of apparautses
in newer civic playgrounds indicates that some risky apparatus are being
included. Michael Van Valkenburgh and Associates (MVVA), for example,
learned that communities are demanding high play value from their public
infrastructure dollars through building New York City’s Teardrop Park
playground and Pier 6 play spaces.49
Additionally, The Beauvoir School,
a private elementary school in Washington DC, designed its playground
with risky elements because the educators and parents understood that high
play value has positive affects on overall learning in children.50
In response
to enthusiastic community requests, the Beauvoir School opened the
playground to the public after school and on weekends within months of
opening. Public acceptance of MVVA’s designs has also been wildly popular.
Decades ahead of the current popular tide for exciting, risky playgrounds,
The Yerba Buena Children’s garden in San Francisco (pictured on pages
12-13), designed and custom built by M. Paul Friedberg & Partners,
opened in 1998 after years of community struggle.51
With a 2-story slide,
large climbing apparatus, and a full compliment of custom, interactive, and
cognitive play features, it is, and was designed to be, CPSC compliant.52

14. 2. At New York City’s
Brooklyn Bridge Park at
Pier 6 Playground (MVVA),
is obvious and pedagogical. In
this example, wood provides
texture and variety, while the
attachments and construction
methods remain visible,
supporting a fast, accessible
slide, where children can learn
about friction, gravity,
and acceleration.
Photo © Andreas Rentsch
24
The Base-Parc in Belleville, Paris
provides high play value through
providing a unique sense of place.
In addition to the astounding physical
scale, attention to detail and multiple
variations on the theme of climbing
throughout supply ample challenge,
risk, and constant surprise.
Photo © landezine
This sculptural playgarden in
Wiesbaden, Germany, designed by
Annabau, includes engaging physical
and mental challenges and surprises
for children of all ages and abilities.
The open plan, wide views, variable
materials, and opportunities for
interactions at many distances and
every possible angle make this a
unique experience, creating positive
memories that endear the children
to the city it is so much a part of.
Photo © archdaily.com
PLAGYROUND WITH HIGH PLAY VALUE
3. The rooftop Yerba Buena
Garden(MPFP)varies
terrain, texture, height, and
engagement levels. Children
can climb a hill and slide,
or quietly talk with friends
among the plantings, or look
for their home on the huge
bronze globe in the flower
garden. Engaging the child at
many levels supplies play value
at many levels.
Photo © Buddy Rogers
1. A play area in British
Columbia leverages natural
forms and materials to deliver
high play value and a strong
sense of place, where many
children can play at once.
Photo © landezine
Opposite Page
1 2
3

15. 26
Conversations with six leading playground equipment industry sales
professionals, the CFO of Beauvoir School, and a designer from MVVA
suggest that a rising strategy among designers seeking to include risk
and therefore increase appeal involves creating apparatus forms that do
not easily fit into currently defined CPSC categories, thus avoiding the
abundance of pre-existing limitations.53
Though their appeal is powerful,
unique apparatuses are expensive and rare in the U.S., and a “playground
gap” is evident between affluent communities and those with more
modest means. Further research into the characteristics and attitudes of
communities that have installed risky apparatus is needed so that the
accepted facts, that influenced these communities, can be utilized to
promote awareness to a greater diversity of communities.
Contrary to American risk-aversion, Europe’s leading playground
designers have designed to include “as much play value as possible, as much
safety as necessary.”54
German playgrounds are among the most challenging
and exciting in the world. Beginning in about 2005, the United Kingdom
went through a play revolution, instituting a new risk-management play
policy and implementing designs and know-how from the continent’s best
playground designers in their playspaces. Besides giving children safe, risky,
fun places to play, the simple act of building proper play spaces had other,
expected and hoped for, effects, such as reducing childhood obesity and
ameliorating childhood behavioral problems.55
Today, European designs are
becoming popular in America’s newest, largest parks.
5. Conclusion
In this article I have argued that risk adds value to play, and that risk
is, indeed, the foundational element of play. However, designers and play
providers face obstacles to including risk on playgrounds, as risk-aversion
is perpetuated in our current “strict liability” legal paradigm that confuses
risk and danger, failing to recognize the pedagogic value of risk in play.
How Americans understand risk’s role in play has affected playground form
and play value since the early 1900s, and increasingly so since the 1970s.
While there has been an increase in interest in providing challenging play
spaces in the recent past, there are still great strides that need to be made in
correcting the national attitude toward risky play.
27
To make proper playgrounds available for all American children, there
must be a change in the perception of risk’s place in play. Most importantly,
an American National Play Policy must be devised. More prominent than
a presidential program and more powerful than suggested guidelines, the
National Play Policy needs to deal in facts, not fearful suppositions. All
of the involved disciplines, from pediatrics to tort law, can use existing,
successful play-related risk management policy from Europe to see potential
hurdles in the American social and legal landscape and formulate inclusive,
cohesive policy to address those issues. The astounding rebirth of play in
the UK is a powerful example of what can be achieved when proper play
becomes a national priority. The astounding rebirth of play in the UK is
a powerful example of what can be achieved when proper play becomes a
national priority. Every risky, exciting, useful playground that designers and
families work to have built, invites more people to work toward realizing our
own, American play revolution.
This paper and the thesis for which my original research was conducted
were written to increase understanding and encourage dialogue about the
state of play in America. This important issue needs to be advanced quickly.
American playground decline was a team effort; changing American
playgrounds into proper, useful, exciting places that endear families to them
will, likewise, require a team effort for change.

16. TABLE I: PLAY VALUE ASPECTS, BY AUTHOR
Table I
Authoritative voices on play and the
aspects contributing to play value they
cite most frequently. The author list is
not exhaustive, but the aspect list reflects
the most common play value aspects
mentioned across the field by many
more authors.
28
Richter
Varied terrain, hills with banks, variety of ground surfaces,
appropriate planting, atmosphere for deep play, challenges,
risks, adventure (Richter 2011, Richter-Spielgerate 2011).
Exercise, spontaneity, creativity, appeal to the imagination,
provide new uses, group play, solitary play, safety,
durability, weather proof (Hunt 1918).
Risk, challenge, games, progression, little or no
supervision, interesting over time, outdoor, free,
spontaneous, child-led, nature
(Frost 2007, American Journal of Play 2008).
Variation, complexity, manipulability, character, change
over time, specific place context, social dimensions,
children’s possibilities and perspectives, children’s
development and learning (Jansson 2010, 67).
Imagination, risk, achievement, mastery, progressive levels,
challenge (Hannan 2012, 10).
Draws attention, varied materials, risk, engages senses,
natural forces, locally relevant (Solomon 2005).
Height, risk, social, physical, psychological
(Ball 2002).
Author Aspects
Hunt
Hammond
Solomon
Frost
Jansson
Gill
Table II
Play value types created or encouraged
by diverse environmental aspects.
The potential developmental value
to the child, drawn from childhood
development experts, is listed. A more
thorough exploration of this content can
be found in my thesis.
29
Quiet or rambunctions
interactions with peers,
leadership, trust
Serves several purposes in
a single form
TABLE II: PLAYGROUND ASPECTS THAT ADD PLAY VALUE
Use senses
Progression
Gross Physical
Fine Physical
Nature
Manipulate
Mutable
Sense of Place
Social
Interesting
Adaptable
Risk
Attractive
Sound, colors, height,
speed, gravity, textures,
smell, temperatures
Challenges exist
even after success
Sheltered spaces or
sheltered areas
Challenges with
attractive rewards
Demands attention,
especially from a distance
Focus, interpretation, attention
Develops trust, leadership,
provides sense of accomplishment
and consequences
Draws attention, invites
sensual or intellectual
exploration
Concentration, focus, curiosity
Fantasy and imagination
Textures, weight, sheltered
Changes over time Passing of time, cause and effect
Height, distance, textures,
mass, momentum,
challenging
Objects or items that can
be moved in relationship
to each other
Locally derived forms,
unique materials,
meaningful placement
Create unique memories,
connections to place or time
Move objects, change shapes,
analyze, predict, evaluate
Forces and aspects of
nature; water, gravel, dirt,
grass, sand, plants, sun,
shade, sounds, wind, heat,
cool, natural materials
and patterns
Experiential, sensual,
child learns cause and effect,
introspective, contemplative,
sense of self, discovery
Attracts attention, invites
interaction, educates about the
physical properties of the world
Invites interaction, demands
concentration, builds skills to
assess and make decision
Involves gross muscle
coordination, sense of
accomplishment
Sense of community, gathering,
sorting, counting, discovery
Play Value Value to Children
Environmental
Aspects

17. 30
SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING
Play Policy Implementation
Ball, David, Tim Gill, and Bernard Spiegal. 2012. Managing Risk in Play Provision:
Implementation Guide. London, UK: Play Safety Forum.
Health and Safety Executive. 2012. Children’s play and leisure - promoting a balanced
approach. Edited by UK Health and Safety executive.
Zimmerman, Sara, Karen Kramer, and Matthew J. Trowbridge. 2013. “Overcoming
Legal Liability Concerns for School-Based Physical Activity Promotion.” American
Journal of Public Health 103 (11):1962-1968.
Risk in Play
Brussoni, Mariana, Lise Olsen, Ian Pike, and David Sleet. 2012. “Risky Play and
Children’s Safety: Balancing Priorities for Optimal Child Development.” International
Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 2012 (9):15.
Bundy, Anita C., Tim Luckett, Paul J. Tranter, Geraldine A. Naughton, Shirley R. Wyver,
Jo Ragen, and Greta Spies. 2009. “The risk is that there is ‘no risk’: a simple, innovative
intervention to increase children’s activity levels.” International Journal of Early Years
Education 17 (1):33-45. doi: 10.1080/09669760802699878.
Frost, Joe L. 2007. Climbing behavior: the nature and benefits of child’s climbing
behaviors. Edited by Playcore.
Randal, Kay. 2007. “Child’s Play: Demise of play bodes ill for healthy child development,
says researcher.” University of Texas Accessed 17 Mar. http://www.utexas.edu/
features/2007/playgrounds/.
Sims, Stephen. 2010. “Qualitative vs Quantitativerisk Assessment.” Accessed 25 Feb 2014.
http://www.sans.edu/research/leadership-laboratory/article/risk-assessment.
Benefits of Play
Catherine L. Ramsteter, Robert Murray, Andrew S. Garner. 2010. “The crucial role of recess
in schools.” The Journal of School Health 80 (11):9. Frost, Joe L. 2006. “The dissolution of
children’s outdoor play: Causes and consequences.” Common Good Conference 31:26.
Ginsburg, Kenneth R, and Committee on Communications and the Committee on
Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health. 2007. “The Importance of Play in
Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child Bonds.”
Pediatrics 119 (1):10.
Hannon, Tamara S, Goutham Rao, and Silvia A Arslanan. 2005. “Childhood Obesity and
Type II Diabetes Mellitus.” Pediatrics 116:10.
Marshall, Simon J, Stuart JH Biddle, James F Sallis, Thomas L McKenzie, and Terry L
Conway. 2002. “Clustering of sedentary behaviors and physical activity among youth: a
cross-national study. / Etude des comportements sedentaires et d ‘ activite physique chez
les jeunes americains et britanniques.” Pediatric Exercise Science 14 (4):401-417.
Moore, Robin C. 1997. “The Need for Nature: A Childhood Right.” Social Justice 24 (3
(69)):203-220. doi: 10.2307/29767032.
Pellegrini, Anthony D. 2008. “The Recess Debate.” American Journal of Play.
31
NOTES
1. Chermayeff, Jane Clark, and Julian Richter. 2013. “Playing it too safe?” American
Society of Landscape Architects annual conference and exposition, Boston
2. Ball, David J. 2002. Playground risks, benefits, and choices. Norwich, UK: School of
Health and social sciences center for decision analysis and risk management.
Brussoni, Mariana, Lise Olsen, Ian Pike, and David Sleet. 2012. “Risky Play and
Children’s Safety: Balancing Priorities for Optimal Child Development.”
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 2012 (9):15.
Bundy, Anita C., Tim Luckett, Paul J. Tranter, Geraldine A. Naughton, Shirley R.
Wyver, Jo Ragen, and Greta Spies. 2009. “The risk is that there is ‘no risk’: a simple,
innovative intervention to increase children’s activity levels.” International Journal of
Early Years Education 17 (1):33-45. doi: 10.1080/09669760802699878.
Hurtwood, Lady Allen of. 1968. Planning for play. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Mayfield, Margie, Chen Chin-Hsiu, Debra Harwood, Terry Rennie, and Michele
Tannock. 2009. “Community Play Spaces: Promoting Young Children’s Play.”
Canadian Children 34 (1):4-12.
Solomon, Susan G. 2005. American Playgrounds: revitalizing community space. New
Hampshire: University Press of New England.
Wallach, Frances. 1992. “Playground Safety: What did we do wrong?” Parks and
Recreation 4 (27):5.
Zalaznick, Matt. 2014. “Perceived risk leaps onto school playgrounds.” District
Administration (August 2013).
American Journal of Play. 2008. “What’s Wrong with America’s playgrounds and how
to fix them.” American Journal of Play Fall 2008:17.
3. Kahn, Chris. 2005. “LAWSUIT FEAR TAKES FUN OUT OF PLAYGROUNDS.”
Augusta Chronicle, HOME & GARDEN; Pg. D05.
Randal, Kay. 2007. “Child’s Play: Demise of play bodes ill for healthy child
development, says researcher.” University of Texas Accessed 17
Mar. http://www.utexas.edu/features/2007/playgrounds/.
Shapiro, T Rees. 2013. “Fairfax county schools place new playground apparatus off
limits to kids.”The Washington post, 31 Jan 2013. http://www.washingtonpost.
com/local/education/playground-r‐fight-a‐fairfax- ‐county--‐schools-‐place-s‐new
-e‐apparatus-0‐off-r‐limits-u‐to-i‐kids/2013/01/31/b95b0176-.‐5a6c-2‐11e2-
2‐88d0-2‐c4cf65c3ad15_print.html.
4. Johnson, Dirk. 1998. “Many Schools putting an end to child’s play.” New York Times,
7 April 1998, A. http://www.nytimes.com/1998/04/07/us/many-schools-putting-
an-end-to-child-s-play.html?pagewanted=print.
5. Playwork Principles Scrutiny Group, 2005, cited in, Gleave, Josie and Issy Cole-
Hamilton. 2012. A literature review on the effects of a lack of play in children’s lives.
Play England, UK.
6. Bingham v Board of Education, 118 Utah 582 (1950), (1950)
7. Hurtwood, Lady Allen of. 1968. Planning for play. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
8. Belluck, Pam. 2005. “Children’s Life Expectancy Being Cut Short by Obesity.” New
York Times, 17 Feb 2005, Health.

18. 32
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/health/17obese.html?_
r=0&pagewanted=print&position=. ;
Also see, Colabianchi, Natalie. 2009. “Does the built environment matter for physical
activity?” Current Cardiovascular Risk Reports 3 (4):302-307. doi: 10.1007/
s12170-009-0046-3.;
Also see, Frank, Lawrence D. 2006. “Many pathways from land use to health: associations
between neighborhood walkability and active transportation, body mass index, and air
quality.” Journal of the American Planning Association 72 (1):75-87.;
Also see, Hannon, Tamara S, Goutham Rao, and Silvia A Arslanan. 2005. “Childhood
Obesity and type II Diabetes Mellitus.” Pediatrics 116:10.;
Also see, Ogden, Cynthia L. 2012. Childhood obesity in the United States: the magnitude
of the problem. Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
9. Ginsburg, Kenneth R, and Committee on Communications and the Committee on
Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health. 2007. “The Importance of Play in
Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child
Bonds.” Pediatrics 119 (1):10.
Also see; Health and Safety Executive. 2012. Children’s play and leisure - promoting a
balanced approach. Edited by UK Health and Safety executive.
10. National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of
Education. 2001. Recess and the importance of play: A position statement on young
children and recess. In ERIC Doc Number ED531984.
online http://www.naecs-sde.org/recessplay.pdf?attredirects=0.
Also see; Catherine L. Ramsteter, Robert Murray, Andrew S. Garner. 2010. “The crucial
role of recess in schools.”The Journal of School Health 80 (11):9;
Also; Hannon, Tamara S, Goutham Rao, and Silvia A Arslanan. 2005. “Childhood
Obesity and type II Diabetes Mellitus.” Pediatrics 116:10.
Also; Pellegrini, Anthony D. 2008. “The Recess Debate.” American Journal of Play.
11. Colabianchi, Natalie. 2009. “Does the built environment matter for physical activity?”
Current Cardiovascular Risk Reports 3 (4):302-307. doi: 10.1007/s12170-009-0046-3.;
Also, Hurtwood, Lady Allen of. 1968. Planning for play. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
12. Randal, Kay. 2007. “Child’s Play: Demise of play bodes ill for healthy child
development, says researcher.” University of Texas Accessed 17 Mar.
http://www.utexas.edu/features/2007/playgrounds/.
13. Howard, Philip K. 2010. “The Freedom to Take Risks.” In Life Without
Lawyrs:Restoring Responsibility in America, 16. W.W. Norton & Company.
14. Peterson, James. 1992. “Playground equipment height.” Parks and Recreation 27 (4):7.
15. American Journal of Play. 2008. “What’s Wrong with America’s playgrounds and how
to fix them.” American Journal of Play Fall 2008:17.
16. Linzmayer, Cara D., and Elizabeth A. Halpenny. 2013. “”It was Fun”: An Evaluation
of Sand Tray Pictures, an Innovative Visually Expressive Method for Researching
Children’s Experiences with Nature.” International Journal of Qualitative Methods
12 (1):310-337.
17. Frost, Joe L. 2007. Climbing behavior: the nature and benefits of child’s climbing
33
behaviors. Edited by Playcore.
Also see, Garneau, P.A. 2001. “Fourteen forms of fun.” Gamasutra.
Also see, Hannan, Maureen. 2012. “Darrell Hammond - How to Unleash the Power of
a Playground.” Parks & Recreation 47 (7):9-11.
Also see, Health and Safety Executive. 2012. Children’s play and leisure - promoting a
balanced approach. Edited by UK Health and Safety executive.
Also see, Howard, Philip K. 2010. “The Freedom to Take Risks.” In Life Without
Lawyrs:Restoring Responsibility in America, 16. W.W. Norton & Company.
Also see, Hurtwood, Lady Allen of. 1968. Planning for play. Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press.
Also see, Linzmayer, Cara D., and Elizabeth A. Halpenny. 2013. “”It was Fun”: An
Evaluation of Sand Tray Pictures, an Innovative Visually Expressive Method
for Researching Children’s Experiences with Nature.” International Journal of
Qualitative Methods 12 (1):310-337.
Also see, Prensky, Marc. 2001. Digital game-based learning: McGraw-Hill.
18. Almon, Joan. Adventure: The value of risk in children’s play. Annapolis, MD: Alliance
for Childhood, 2013.
19. Brussoni, Mariana, Lise Olsen, Ian Pike, and David Sleet. 2012. “Risky Play and
Children’s Safety: Balancing Priorities for Optimal Child Development.”
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 2012 (9):15.
20. Kutska, Kenneth S. International Playground Safety Institute. Dec 13, 2013. http://
blog.internationalplaygroundsafetyinstitute.com/playground-safety/can-we-
eliminate-serious-injuries-through-legislation-part-2-step-1-–-international-
standards-embracing-playground-surfacing-compliance-test-method/ (accessed 09
15, 2014).
21. Almon, Joan. Adventure: The value of risk in children’s play. Annapolis, MD: Alliance
for Childhood, 2013.
Also, Solomon, Susan G. 2005. American Playgrounds: revitalizing community space.
New Hampshire: University Press of New England.
22. Frost, Joe L. 1986. “History of Playground Safety in America.” Children’s
Environments Quarterly 2 (4):11;
Also, Frost, Joe L. 2007. Climbing behavior: the nature and benefits of child’s climbing
behaviors. Edited by Playcore.
Also; Richter-Spielgerate. 2011. “Play Value and implementing it at playgrounds.”
Accessed 14 Jun. http://www.richter-spielgeraete.de/play-value.html.
23. Smith, Stephen J., 1998. Risk and Our Pedagogical Relation to Children,
On the Playground and Beyond. SUNY series, Early Childhood Education: Inquiries
and Insights.
24. Wallach, Frances. 1992. “Playground Safety: What did we do wrong?” Parks and
Recreation 4 (27):5.
25. McManus and Furnham’s research points out that children typically find risky
situations to be “fun” and are predisposed to find it so (McManus, I. C., and Adrian
Furnham. 2010.
Also, “Fun, Fun, Fun”: Types of Fun, Attitudes to Fun, and their Relation to Personality

19. 3534
and Biographical Factors.” Psychology 01 (03):159-168.
26. Frost, Joe L. 2007. Climbing behavior: the nature and benefits of child’s climbing
behaviors. Edited by Playcore.
27. Jean Lee Hunt described the intrinsic value of playthings as follows,
“The play of children on it and with it must be spontaneous [and it must have]
adaptability to different kinds of play and exercise. It must appeal to the
imagination of the child so strongly that new forms of use must be constantly
found by the child himself in using it. [It should be] adaptable to individual or
group use. It should lend itself to solitary play or to use by several flayers (sic.) at
once” (Hunt 1918).
I look forward to seeing a planned paper from MDPI “The Attractiveness of the
Children’s Playground – An Attempt of Empirical Research” by, Kotliar I. and
Sokolova M., from Moscow State University of Psychology and Education, and
Dubna International University for Nature, Society and Man. From the abstract,
they analyzed the “quality of the playground environment, from 367 structured
observations for two months on 16 public playgrounds in the center of Moscow…
Analysis…suggests that typical city playground objects do not meet the child`s
needs by involving him/her in healthy activities and they need rethinking and
transformation.” See more at, http://www.mdpi.com/journal/children/special_
issues/play_children_health#published.
28. See the thesis for a more complete history of playground litigation and the effect that
sovereign immunity had on the compensation paradigm.
29. U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. 2010. Public Playground Safety
Handbook. Bethesday MD: US Consumer Product Safety Commission.
30. A more precise understanding of risk’s role in play, as defined by child development
and play experts, is summarized by David J. Ball, Professor of the School of Health
and Social Sciences, Middlesex University, as he explains that risk on playgrounds
is different than other kinds of risk, “Simply put, in playgrounds, risks are held to
serve some purpose; in conventional factories, they are not. A further implication is
that the legal concept of ‘(reasonably) foreseeable risk’ should not be interpreted in
playgrounds in the same way as in factories” (Ball 2002, 49).
31. Barton, Benjamin H. 2006. “Tort reform, innovation, and playground design.”
University of Florida Law Review 58 (2).
32. Benjamin H. Barton, JD and torts historian, writing in the Florida Law Review,
remarked on the societal shift of the time. Americans, he asserts, “…began to
look at products differently. A uniquely lawyerly pursuit (looking at a product or
activity and trying to spin out its worst case scenario [or potential risks]) became
something of a national pastime”.
33. U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. 2010. Public Playground Safety
Handbook. Bethesday MD: US Consumer Product Safety Commission.
34. Frost, Joe L., and Theodora B. Sweeney. 1995. Cause and Prevention of Playground
Injuries and Litigation; Case Studies.
35. Frost, Joe L., and Theodora B. Sweeney. 1995. Cause and Prevention of Playground
Injuries and Litigation; Case Studies.
36. Ball, David, Tim Gill, and Bernard Spiegal. 2012. Managing Risk in Play Provision:
Implementation Guide. London, UK: Play Safety Forum.
37. O’Brien, Craig W. 2009. Injuries and Investigated Deaths Associated with
Playground Equipment, 2001-2008. Bethesda, MD: Consumer Product Safety
Commission.
38. Frost, Joe L., and Theodora B. Sweeney. 1995. Cause and Prevention of Playground
Injuries and Litigation; Case Studies.
39. Byington, John S. 1979. “Public regulation of consumer products and product
liability.”The Interface 14 (2):11.
40. This downward spiral has effectively “dumbed down” playgrounds by forcing play
providers to cater to the rarest common denominator; the injured. See a
deeper discussion in the thesis, and also in Frost and Sweeney, and Solomon.
41. Ball, David, Tim Gill, and Bernard Spiegal. 2012. Managing Risk in Play
Provision: Implementation Guide. London, UK: Play Safety Forum.
42. Solomon, Susan G. 2005. American Playgrounds: revitalizing community space.
New Hampshire: University Press of New England.
43. See the works of Frost, Gill, Hammond, Hunt, Hurtwood, Jansson, Richter, and
Solomon for full discussions regarding aspects that create play value.
44. American Journal of Play. 2008. “What’s Wrong with America’s playgrounds and
how to fix them.” American Journal of Play Fall 2008:17.
45. Jansson, Märit. 2010. “Attractive Playgrounds: Some Factors Affecting User
Interest and Visiting Patterns.” Landscape Research 35 (1):63-81.
46. Frost, Joe L. 1986. “History of Playground Safety in America.” Children’s
Environments Quarterly 2 (4):11.
47. Solomon, Susan G. 2005. American Playgrounds: revitalizing community space.
New Hampshire: University Press of New England.
48. Jansson, Märit, and Bengt Persson. 2010. “Playground planning and management:
An evaluation of standard-influenced provision through user needs.” Urban
Forestry & Urban Greening 9 (1):33-42. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
ufug.2009.10.003.
49. Hall, Arthur P. 2014. “Correspondence with Arthur P. Hall.”
50. Rick A. Parisi FASLA, M. Paul Friedberg & Partners, 2014. “Correspondence
with Rick Parisi.”
50. Rick A. Parisi FASLA, M. Paul Friedberg & Partners, 2014. “Correspondence
with Rick Parisi.”
52. Kutska, Kenneth S. International Playground Safety Institute. Dec 13, 2013.
http://blog.internationalplaygroundsafetyinstitute.com/playground-safety/
can-we-eliminate-serious-injuries-through-legislation-part-2-step-1-–-
international-standards-embracing-playground-surfacing-compliance-test-
method/ (accessed 09 15, 2014).
53. Richter-Spielgerate. 2011. “Play Value and implementing it at playgrounds.”
Accessed 14 Jun. http://www.richter-spielgeraete.de/play-value.html.
54. Hurtwood, Lady Allen of. 1968. Planning for play. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press;
Also, Solomon, Susan G. 2005. American Playgrounds: revitalizing community
space. New Hampshire: University Press of New England.

20. BIOGRAPHY
Shannon MIKO Mikus
Shannon “MIKO” Mikus spent 20 years serving as a US Air Force
Maintenance Officer before embarking on a second career in landscape
architecture. MIKO graduated from the US Air Force Academy in 1992,
led deployed AC-130 Gunship maintenance teams for Air Force Special
Operations Command, served as the Logistics Test Director for the V-22
Osprey test program, and brought disparate, specialized people together to
help develop aircraft systems prognostics, RFID technology, and logistics
tracking technology while at the Pentagon. Throughout his military
service he traveled globally, living in Japan, Germany, and Saudi Arabia.
Experiencing these varied locations and cultures deepened MIKO’s passion
for public spaces, particularly those that serve the community’s core, families.
After retiring from the military, early and lifelong interests in art,
nature, and public space brought MIKO to the University of Georgia,
where he earned a Masters of Landscape Architecture. His Master’s thesis,
“Risk Aversion and the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s Effect
on American Playground Design” grew out of his dedication to creating
vibrant and sustainable “family-scapes.” At the University of Georgia
MIKO was one of six students who designed the Georgia Garden for the
2104 International Horticultural Exhibition in Qingdao, China. The team
traveled to Qingdao for “Georgia Day” events in the garden and their work
earned the “2014 Outside Garden Competition, Grand Award”. MIKO is
currently traveling the nation with his family in a restored Airstream trailer.
MIKO can be contacted via email at mikozilla@earthlink.net, and his
complete resume and MA thesis are also available on LinkedIn.

21. 32
Richter Spielgeräte GmbH
The original, for more than 40 years!