Travers Park receiving playground makeover

This summer, Isabella Noble will have her own playground.

The equipment will belong to the city, and children of all stripes will play there, but for the Sagle 8-year-old, the $50,000 playground equipment slated for Travers Park will have special meaning.

It is special equipment.

Isabella has Rett Syndrome, a nervous system disorder that affects muscle use and cognitive skills and requires she use a wheelchair. The new equipment will replace outdated slides and swings and will accommodate children with disabilities, Kim Woodruff, Sandpoint Parks and Recreation director said.

It will be the first Sandpoint park with a handicap-accessible playground.

“It’s rather large and all accessible to kids in wheelchairs,” Woodruff said.

The idea for the new equipment came from a grassroots organization called Everyone Plays. Isabella’s mother, Tanya Noble, belongs to the group along with local physical therapists and members of the parks and rec board.

The group formed a few years ago in an effort to upgrade the city’s more than a dozen parks to provide a place for disabled children to play.

Travers Park was chosen for the remodel because it has plenty of handicap parking, Tanya said, as well as a restroom. The park and its playground was built in 1986, according to the city, and the equipment was due for an upgrade.

The metal and wood playground at Travers is built on a hill, which makes it difficult for anyone in a wheelchair to approach, but Noble and her husband Brian, a pastor at a nearby church, use the park because of its location.

Several years ago, Isabella was small enough to carry, and her parents would slide with her on their laps. But, at 60 pounds — Isabella’s current weight — play has become work.

“Getting her up the steps, carrying her, that’s the dangerous part,” Noble said. “When you try to carry an 8-year-old child, it tends to be tricky.”

Noble leaves that part to her husband.

She and Brian cover both ends of the slide. One of them carries their daughter and places her on the slide while the other one catches her at the bottom because her challenged muscle control prevents the 8-year-old from stopping, or getting off by herself.

The new equipment with its wider slide, ramps and easily accessible equipment will be a positive change for Isabella, as well as other children, Noble said.

“It’ll be fun for kids who don’t have disabilities to play alongside Isabella,” she said. “That exposure is really healthy for kids, to see other kids with a disability. They can play with them. It breaks down barriers and stereotypes.”

Everyone Plays received a $5,000 grant for the new playground, and the city chipped in with grants and money from two park funds to cover the cost of the equipment. The grassroots group will solicit donations for wood chips used as a cushion around the equipment, and to assemble the playground this summer.

The playground will include climbing walls, swings, a two-bay slide and a roof.

“It will be a good a really nice addition to the park,” Woodruff said.

Isabella is anticipating the new addition.

“She loves to play, she loves to swing and be outside,” her mother said. “And it’s no fun when we can’t do those things.”