Top 10 U.S. Parks Using Recycled Rubber for Accessible, All Season Play
A look at 10 parks and playgrounds around the country that use recycled rubber to promote active play throughout the year.
And on playgrounds, recycled rubber surfaces offer a soft landing spot for children of all ages and abilities. The surfaces are perfect for recreational spaces geared toward everyone, thanks to their smoothness for wheelchairs, ability to drain water after rainfall and all-season consistency.
Plus, recycled rubber can take on any color or shape, making a playground a world ripe for imaginative play.
Here’s a look at 10 parks and playgrounds around the country that use recycled rubber to promote active play throughout the year.
As BPI Program Director Scott Gerber recently highlighted, Shipyard Park offers baseball fields located on the water. The fields, which use recycled rubber in their synthetic turf surfaces, are accessible throughout the year and host tournaments for elite high school and college teams.
At Collinwood, the Cleveland Browns and the City of Cleveland are in the process of installing a new synthetic turf surface that will play host to a variety of sports and community activities. The durable surface is intended to fuel student engagement throughout the Cleveland Metropolitan School District.
This artist-designed park uses recycled rubber — both in a poured-in-place playground surface and synthetic turf — as a base for its swings and activities. It includes a wheelchair-accessible spinner and multiple sensory music elements.
This expansive southern California park comes from Shane’s Inspiration, a nonprofit founded in 1998 by Catherine Curry Williams and Scott Williams in memory of their son, Shane Alexander. The organization is dedicated to creating accessible playgrounds that integrate children of all abilities. Rocket’s Universe takes on a space theme, with displays of the eight planets and easily-accessible mini-rides. It is a place for kids to play and engage their curiosity, and with its rubber surfacing, it is available all year.
This playground, dedicated to the founder’s son, Zach, exclusively uses equipment that exceeds ADA standards, ensuring that kids of all abilities can access it. It includes a music section for auditory stimulation and activities tailored toward accessibility, such as metal slides available to those with cochlear implants.
As we wrote in a recent BPI blog post, Clemyjontri is designed to provide a place to play for kids of all ages and abilities. The park chose recycled rubber for its surface to provide a safe landing spot and a smooth surface for wheelchair mobility.
This neighborhood park, which uses an artificial turf surface, features a basket swing and ground-level sensory panels. Plus, it’s not too crowded of a destination — making it perfect for kids who like to avoid crowds.
Located at the historic Delano Park, Riverwild Park includes accessible rubber surfacing and ramps, so that children with support equipment don’t have to leave their support behind to have fun.
This playground, located at McBride Elementary School, honors the school’s beloved former special education teacher, Nick Hostler, who passed away in 2018. Mr. Nick hoped for a more inclusive play environment for the community. On top of a navy surface using recycled rubber, the playground includes amenities like a mini-zipline and universal swings so kids of all abilities can play side by side at recess and P.E. class.
Butterfly Playground is part of Morgan’s Wonderland, which is a family-friendly theme park in San Antonio designed for accessibility. Butterfly features elevated activity panels for kids in wheelchairs, backed by “soft, squishy rubberized flooring.”
Opening this summer, this playground will be marine-themed with blue rubber surfacing mimicking the ocean and, as Seattle’s Child writes, providing “a forgiving landing spot for climbers.” It features accessible ramps and tall play structures, all placed near the Seattle waterfront and within walking distance of Pike Place Market.
