Play Park Pointe Closed to Public Effective Immediately and Until Further Notice

Play Park Pointe is closed to the public effective immediately and until further notice due to safety concerns caused by severe deterioration of the play structure.  City staff will begin working with the Park Advisory Board and the City Council regarding the future of Play Park Pointe. Stay tuned for further updates as they become available. Please do not cross the barriers and do not play on the play structure while the park is closed.

If you have any questions, please contact City Hall at 316-775-4510.

**UPDATE AS OF 3/7/2020**

Our last post did not have much detail on the playground closure, so we wanted to provide more information. The primary issue that led to closure is below the mulch. The structural support posts holding up the main structures are severely damaged through a combination of rot and termites. Some of the support posts are essentially non-existent.

The City has spent over $120,000 in the last five years, including the 2017 rehab project to maintain this playground. The issue is that it was constructed with wood, and the mulch surfacing has contributed to and hidden the extent of the damage to the main structural supports. As part of the rehab in 2017 we addressed every concern raised by the playground inspector in a 2015 report. However, that inspection did not excavate below the mulch to uncover the full extent of the damage to the main structures. We uncovered and repaired a number of the supports during that rehab project, but only a fraction of them because that level of repair was not included in the project scope.

The City recognizes the value of this playground and its importance to our community. Our actions to close the park at this moment are tied directly to legitimate safety concerns. Once we have a chance to investigate the issue in greater detail, we can make better decisions about next steps for the future of the playground. We have a park board meeting coming up on March 10 to begin discussions, but we still have work to complete for a full scale investigation of the damage below the mulch line. We'll keep the community posted as we find out more.

A few images showing examples of the deterioration of the structure are included below. You can view more photos on the update post on the City's Facebook page.