On October 28, Volunteers from PECO, the city of Chester, the Chester Education Foundation, the Chester Community Improvement Project, city residents and organizers from KaBOOM! spent six hours constructing the playground from scratch.
Funded through a $60,000 contribution from PECO, the playground required 160 cubic yards of mulch and about 6 tons of concrete for its base. Its design was completed by KaBOOM!, which incorporated the ideas given by Chester at the organization’s Design Day.
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DESIGNED BY KIDS, BUILT BY VOLUNTEERS:
PECO, CITY OF CHESTER, CHESTER EDUCATION FOUNDATION, CHESTER COMMUNITY IMPROVEMENT PROJECT AND KaBOOM! TEAM UP TO BUILD NEW PLAYGROUND IN JUST ONE DAY FOR CHILDREN
WHAT: More than 250 volunteers from PECO, the City of Chester, the Chester Education Foundation, the Chester Community Improvement Project, organizers from KaBOOM! and residents of the local community will join forces on Thursday, Oct. 28 to build a new, safe playground at Chester Park. The new playground’s design is based on drawings created by children who participated in a Design Day event in September.
WHY: The new playground will provide more than 700 children in the Chester community with a safe place to play. Currently, the children who go to Chester Park only have old, out-dated equipment to play on, which will be removed to make way for the new playground.. The playground is the second built by KaBOOM! and PECO, and one of more than 180 KaBOOM! will lead across the country in 2010 in an effort to provide a great place to play within walking distance of every child in America.
WHEN: Thursday, October 28
8:30 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Kick off ceremony and volunteer deployment
11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Best viewing of playground construction
1:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. Final construction phase and adjustments
2:30 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. Ribbon-cutting ceremony to dedicate new play area
(Note: all times approximate)
WHERE: Chester Park
143 Elkinton Blvd
Chester, PA 19013
143 Elkinton Blvd
Chester, PA 19013
WHO: Hundreds of volunteers from the community
VISUALS: Before and after shots of the site
Volunteers assembling brightly colored playground equipment
Volunteers moving 43,740 square feet of safety surfacing by hand
Ribbon-cutting ceremony to dedicate the playground
Stefan - I hope you got to go over to the park yesterday and see all of the volunteers who worked on the Playground for Peace. There were volunteers from Kaboom, PECO, Chester High School and the surrounding community all working together to build this beautiful playground for children. It was a beautiful thing - my only complaint is that of course - because it was a good thing - the only news station that showed up was Channel 6 - and even that was just a film guy, no reporters. What will it take to bring the good things in Chester to the news??!!
ReplyDeleteI'm a concerned neighbor living on W. Avon, just a few blocks from the park. I was just at the park yesterday with my family and I saw that the gate is still up around the new playground. There were several other families and children wondering around also. So, just a few minutes ago, I called the city of Chester, Parks department and they said it was supposed to be taken down by Nov 2nd by the construction company. Since that never happened, they are trying to get a new committment from them when they will have the gate removed, but don't have a new date yet. So, the new playground is completely finished, but we are waiting for the gate to be removed. This is rediculous!!!!!! Maybe I'll just go down there and do it myself!? Why is this so hard to accomplish?
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