Community, Adult Playgrounds – What Next?

Peter Wright

Community, adult playgrounds and what next all came into my mind this week for different reasons. Why? because although they are all different topics they are interconnected. Let’s start with adult playgrounds, move onto community, ponder what’s next and then see how all three might be connected.

Ball Pit courtesy 3dMan-eu / pixabay

On the way to an event in Thorndale, Ontario on Wednesday a week ago, I listened to a discussion on adult playgrounds in Canada. I expected to hear about golf courses, climbing walls, paint ball parks or perhaps something more sinister. To my surprise the participants were talking about the same types of playgrounds children have loved for generations. I heard one of the women – I would guess she was 40 ish – laughingly describing her enjoyment of playing in a ball pit like the one in the photo above.

The interviewer then spoke to a couple in their late 60s who were having the time of their lives. They were regulars at the adult ball pit. They enjoyed the freedom of playing like children without having to worry about burying a young child under thousands of plastic balls.

My first reaction was ” Really? It sounded as if I am hearing someone entering her second childhood.” Then I thought about it and realised that playing in a ball pit is all about having fun, it might not help your fitness level as much as running, cycling or walking. But, it is probably better for you than watching TV. So who cares whether it’s considered a kid’s or an adult’s form of fun? Is there really any difference?

Adult Playgrounds or Outdoor Gyms?

It’s hard to know where adult playgrounds stop and outdoor gyms start. It seems many of the more successful combine both. With outdoor gym equipment for the fitness enthusiasts, swings, slides and more fun stuff for the others . Here’s a selection of 13 different adult playgrounds around the world. Although I am not sure the first one, Chamber of Horrors is rightly called a playground.

Britain is home to many outdoor gyms and adult playgrounds. One example is an innovative park in Hull that lets users generate electricity for the grid as they pedal, push and pant their way to fitness.

Fitness experts are seeing many advantages of taking gyms outdoors. Because many users are put off conventional indoor gyms by the price of membership, crowded facilities, noise and rigid scheduling. In contrast, outdoor gyms are generally built by municipalities, are free and can be used at any convenient time. Read about the British experience in this BBC report.

Community

The event I attended was the Teeny Tiny Summit held at the Purple Hill Music Hall. The theme was “Big Ideas For Small Places”

Purple Hill Country Music Hall, Thorndale, Ontario

Small towns and villages in Ontario are slowly dying. This is not a new thing, it has been happening for decades and is affecting small communities in most of the world.

The urban drift is hard to reverse. More new jobs are created in large cities, the attraction of city life is hard to resist for under or un-employed young people. As rural populations decline, businesses and service providers in small towns close their doors. The ability to use the Internet for many transactions that only 10 years ago required a trip to the bank, post office or to pay bills has led to many of these closures. Business closures mean people move away, houses stand empty, less money in the local economy. The cycle repeats until the town becomes a retirement community or a ghost town.

The Teeny Tiny Summit

Keynote speaker, Australian Peter Kenyon from the Bank of IDEAS, enthralled the audience of over 100 with so many success stories from Australia and New Zealand that it was difficult to remember them all. I wrote about one of these in this post on Tiny Home Geniuses.

Other speakers presented heartwarming Canadian success stories about small towns being revitalised. The Mayor of Lucan, Cathy Burghardt spoke about the successful campaign to win the 2018 Kraft Hockeyville award for Lucan. Shelagh Morrison shared the success of the Ailsa Craig Quilt & Fibre Arts Festival. Arden McClean and Becky Clark took us through the development and launch of the I Love Thorndale promotion which has now inspired other small communities in Ontario and beyond.

Terrilee Kelford of Cornerstone Landing youth services spoke about the problem of homeless young people in smaller communities where there were fewer facilities than in larger centres. Encouragingly, she mentioned positive moves by provincial and local levels of government to make it easier to build or park tiny homes on residential plots. In addition she told us about her organisation’s plan to build a tiny home community with five tiny homes as a pilot project for affordable housing for low income earners.

The Takeaway for Community Survival

The most important message I got from the summit was the fact hammered home by Peter Kenyon and endorsed by all the other speakers was that the survival of small communities starts within those communities. It does not start with a government grant, a fact finding commission, an outside project, a team of experts or a government development programme.

In all the successful communities which had avoided extinction and a few which had surpassed their former glory someone or a small group did something. That someone decided that their town was not going to die. They looked at their resources, had a vision and worked with what they had.

Quotation used by Peter Kenyon

A leader or leaders soon emerged, others caught their excitement and things started happening. That’s when some communities decided to get advice from consultants, get grants or talk to sponsors. Some teamed up with neighbouring communities.

AI, Remote workers and Community

Technology in various forms is taking away “traditional” jobs by automating many and exporting others to developing countries. In some ways, for example by making online shopping and banking easier, by making farmers less dependent on human labour, it is aggravating the slow dying of small communities.

The same advances in technology and changes in the nature of work are making it easier for many of us to be remote workers. I am typing this post on a computer in my home office on a farm in a rural area. A farm, not even a hamlet or a village. The nearest small city is only 12 km away, but with a mobile phone, laptop and Internet connection I could work anywhere. I can also write for clients on the other side of the world. I am working with a local business Karytech Solutions that provides skills in the reverse direction. Finding technical workers in Europe to provide unique expertise to North American businesses remotely. With a partner in Europe another in Waterloo, we communicate with each other and clients by video conference call from the comfort of our home offices.

Why are adult playgrounds in cities becoming popular?

Because many city dwellers enjoy being outside, being able to exercise in the fresh air. Being able to just come and go as they please, not have to squeeze visits to overcrowded, indoor gyms or entertainment centres into tight schedules. These facilities offer a degree of freedom and simplicity.

The pressure to develop more land for urbanisation takes away farmland needed for growing food.

It doesn’t make sense that schools, houses and commercial buildings in smaller centres are standing empty. Doomed to decay while acres of farmland around new urban housing developments are being turned into housing. All requiring more acres for new highways, shopping malls and parking lots.

If the projections of a decline in the global population mentioned in this post are correct, many of these new developments may be concrete and ashphalt deserts in my grandchildren’s lifetimes

What Next?

How can the problems of dying small communities, loss of traditional jobs, expense and stress of living in a big city, damage to the environment by long commutes and traffic jams be turned into opportunities with advantages for all the players?

Why do people like living in small communities?

• Clean air, healthier
• Short or no commuting times
• Lower housing costs
• Friendlier neighbours
• Closer to nature
• Lower crime rates
• Peaceful
• Lower stress levels
• Less impact on the environment

All these are about quality of life. Over the last 20 years, technology has overcome many of the old disadvantages of living in a small community.

• Income – many opportunities to work remotely
• Entertainment – Streaming video services overcome poor broadcast reception
• Online commerce for banking and shopping
• Boredom – many opportunities for exercise, volunteer work exploring the countryside, community activities.
• Antiquated houses – many small, rural communities have modern housing choices.

Conclusion

From the summit it is clear that the trend of small communities fading into extinction can be reversed.

Small communities have a lot to offer increasingly jaded big city dwellers.

Technology, simple economics, new forms of entertainment, opportunities for a healthy lifestyle and concern for the environment can all work in favour of small towns and villages.

It has to be a bottom up, starting from the inside process. It just needs one person to start, to have a vision and get others excited.

What do you think? Do you see advantages in revitalising rural communities? Leave a comment.

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