Map of the Day: Playgrounds And Truck Routes

Here's a way to find out if your neighborhood is kid-friendly. The website PlayaroundNYC has assembled a map charting the locations of playgrounds and their distances from major and minor truck routes. The areas that are darker in color have greater access to playgrounds that aren't surrounded by truck routes than the areas that are lighter in color. Though the map doesn't account for other variables impacting playground quality — like quality of play equipment, population density, or the availability of park restrooms — it's an interesting way to see how different parts of the city cater to children. According to the folks responsible for the map, "[i]t's unfortunate that the easiest locations to place playgrounds are on land left over from major highway construction rather than locations that are more appropriate for supporting young New Yorkers."

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By Ben Muessig in News on January 19, 2010 5:21 PM

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Noel

Hi Everyone,

I'm the developer of PlayaroundNYC. Thanks for taking the time to check it out. I wanted to take a minute to address a couple of the comments here.

PlayaroundNYC is not a playground finder, I'm sorry if this was not clear. Looking at the map in retrospect, I can see how this mistake could be made. The goal of PlayaroundNYC was not to recommend where you should take your children or to try and help you find playgrounds to take your children to. The Parks Department website is a much better resource in that regard.

PlayaroundNYC is a study of playground support around the city with the goal of illuminating how well distributed playgrounds are to the populace of NYC and how nearby conditions affect those playgrounds.

Some of the comments here are correct about playground density near housing projects. When NYC built projects for lower income families, the city did a very good job of providing facilities like playgrounds to the residents. This is something the city should be commended for and while I can understand that families outside of the projects may not be comfortable taking their children to these playgrounds, that's ultimately irrelevant to what's being displayed on the map. I have no intention of "penalizing" the city in ratings for providing playgrounds in lower income neighborhoods or (as has been recommended in other forums) high crime areas.

@Knickerbocker - The northern part of Ft. Greene has a lot of playgrounds, not all of which are right under the BQE. Ashford Playground, which is right under the BQE, is in a pink area not because it's a great playground, but because people living in that area can easily walk to other nearby playgrounds that are of decent quality (e.g., not Ashford). Playground effects are partially cumulative as well, so if an area has mostly mediocre playgrounds, but a lot of them, that will somewhat help raise a rating.

I hope this explanation has made things more clear. I'm going to make revisions to the project in Feb/Mar and will try to be more explicit on the map page itself as the explanation of the map is currently distributed onto the "intro" and "how it works" pages.

Thanks,

Noel Billig

Knickerbocker

Useless. Even using its own methodology.

I live in Ft Greene with my 3 y.o. boy, and this map makes no sense.

How are the playgrounds directly under the BQE (Flushing Ave) considered 'pink' as in partially acceptable. The BQE is a giant truck route. Just because the roadway is overhead does not mean you are safe.

Lame single serving site.