 Photo Elliott Burr/Town Crier
Special Projects Manager Dave Brees said the new playground structures at Heritage Oaks Park encourage adventure and accommodate young people with disabilities. The city of Los Altos capped a nearly six-year process of revamping playgrounds last week, installing the final structure in the project at Heritage Oaks Park.
According to Dave Brees, special projects manager, the Heritage Oaks playground overhaul is the first of its kind in the Bay Area.
“We kept in mind childhood obesity in going through with this playground,” Brees said. “We want to encourage adventure and body coordination, and this design appealed to us over the more sedative ones.”
The third remodel at the site since 1988, the $105,000 facelift features multiple rock formations connected by ropes atop a pillowy bed of wood fibar, replacing a larger, wooden castlelike structure. All that remains to be installed at the park, situated at the corner of Miramonte and Portland avenues, are garbage cans and another bench.
State regulations passed in 1997 mandated cities throughout California create firm agendas by 2000 to meet National Playground Safety Institute certification, so the city embarked on a $600,000 voter-approved renovation of its parks.
The city made the playground Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant by adding a wheelchair ramp as well as building the rock elements to accommodate young people with disabilities.
“There’s no specific area designed for wheelchair access, but there’s nothing designed to discourage it,” Brees said. “Somebody in a wheelchair can enter the playground, and go right up to one of the rocks and play around on it.”
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