The Bourtons - Little Bourton Play Area
Community Pages > Play Areas > Little Bourton Play AreaThe Little Bourton play area, located near the bottom of Chapel Lane, is a large play space with lots of potential!
For years it had only limited equipment but enjoyed good views down the Cherwell Valley. However extensive refurbishment commenced in November 2008 thanks to generous grants from TOE, SITA and Cherwell District Council, lots of fundraising and a contribution from Bourtons Parish Council.
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Now, at last, after long years of waiting, changes have started!
In the middle of October contracters came and felled the four tall Leylandii trees, before they fell where they were not wanted. Another one came down in a gale and JUST missed the new dog mess bin a couple of years ago. The area seemed more open and friendly straight away.They also cut away the low branches of two sycamores, the one by the gate and one encroaching on the field, and took out dead trees from the hedge and chipped them. There's still a bit of clearing to do, then we intend to plant some new native shrubs and trees, to increase bio-diversity. Some of the children would like to help with choosing and planting these.
At the beginning of November the new Robinia-wood play equipment arrived, the week before it was expected, and in a lorry too big to drive into the village! Very many thanks are due to Sam, the landlord at The Plough, for sorting that one out.
The following week Henry and George arrived to start installation, and the children and I have been amazed at the progress they have made each day, working from early morning till after dark, and at the weekend.
The weather has been really unkind to them, grey and damp to start with and then heavy rain. With a lovely view out over the extensively flooded Cherwell Valley, the dumper truck and digger have made deep ruts, and quagmires of mud, and the metre deep holes for the apparatus posts have almost filled with water. They have made-good with top-soil filling and new turves, but a lot of extra work.
The wood looks good and chunky and robust, and is sufficiently uneven to be interestingly crooked. Robinia is harder than oak and naturally resistent to rotting, without chemical treatment. It comes from 'sustainable forests' in Germany. The equipment is made by Sik Holz GmbH, the German partner company to The Childrens Playground Co Ltd from whom we are buying our play equipment.
I think the children will find the climbing and balancing quite challenging in places, and yet there will be parts where even the tinies will be able to climb, swing, slide, roll or rock.
And there's a new easy path for anyone to get up, and some lovely new steps for a quick scramble.
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| Moving starts and security fencing in place | Target wall is propped in position |
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| New earthworks around embankment slide | After school Josh and Nick admire the progress |
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Most of the apparatus is in place |
Rubber grow-through grass matting and new turf cover the quagmire and surround the equipment - here the junior swings and climbing octagon. |
It should be one more week of completion, tarmac and cleaning up. Then, after safety inspection, it will need a couple of weeks of good weather (!) to settle in the grass before the children play there.
(We might manage a sneek preview as soon as all the workmen have finished. Watch this space!)
Friday 5th Dec '08. Update. Tarmac has been laid this week on the paths, and ball area by target wall, and is looking good. Think we'll need to move old barrier, for securing bikes, and put some new gates to make access smoother.
Nicholsons completed their hedge-clearing, and measured up and gave me advice on new tree planting.
The ground under the new turf is still very squishy in places, but the grass IS beginning to grow through the grass matting. Fingers crossed for some drier weather before Chritmas holidays begin.
Friday 12th Dec '08 The ROSPA Playground Safety Inspector came yesterday to make the post-installation inspection of the new equipment. He found only a few minor faults such as missing bolt covers to be remedied, which I hope will be done next week. However, the bad news is that he strongly recommends that we do not use the playground until the new year, to give the new grass time to establish, as the ground is still VERY soft.
My thanks to Nick from the Lock Cottage, and his strong friend with a sledge hammer, for clearing up the broken pallets and old swing frame, and re-alligning the security fencing to make access to the car-park, grit-bin, and dog-bin, which I note needs a new post.
Thursday 8th January 2009 A red-letter day indeed! Today the barriers came down and the first children came to play on the new equipment in the park. Ellen and Louis were the first to discover that the men had been to finish off the work and it was now safe for them to go on, but the word soon spread to other children and parents, and darkness just made it more exciting!"Time to go home?" "no!"
"Oh well , see you here tomorrow! It's great!"
Easter 2009 - 13-4-09
The grass is growing nicely through all the rubber matting and shows clearly how popular the basket swing is proving, for lying down for a soothing gentle rock or a dynamic challenging swing.
The park is getting lots of happy visitors form near and far.
Last week a working party of children and adults planted 65 little hazel bushes in a curving hedge along the front of the park.These can be kept clipped short near the start of the access path and allowed to grow taller to their Spring catkinny, Autumn yellow-leaved, nutty glory further along where there is more space. We'll plant a pussy willow(goat willow) along in that space too, for catkin comparison. Bottling water in polypins to water them in was quite hard work, so I was not sorry to see the rain. However it would have been helpful if it had stopped when Tabula brought our new picnic table from Cumbria to install on Thursday. Efforts to make the concrete pads level in the sloping ground seem to be good enough. Should be a good place for a chat while little ones ride the springers.
The renovated bin is back in place, near enough to the road for the dustmen to empty, I hope. So if you see any rubbish lying around please pop it in.
Shiny yellow Celandines and blue ground ivy flowers are flourishing and looking beautiful in the grass, and the moles have slowed down their explorations. though damper ground may bring them back, after the worms. I will try and get some grass seed in along the front bank this week.
The end of April has seen the building of the picnic shelter,adult-sized, at the far end of the field.You can survey activity on the field or enjoy the view over the Cherwell Valley. I hope that some of the older residents of the village will see it as a place to walk to and chat. especially through the summer.
Last Wednesday evening we had a working party to mulch the little hazels with bark that Tim Shardlow from Nicholsons Nursery kindly brought and shovelled from his trailer into barrows and buckets for us. The trees are looking healthy and the helpers happy at a job shared and well done. Thank you all.
Sally