In late June 2023, Woodlands Park in Perrysburg joined the list of local parks that now offer inclusive equipment to their visitors. The inclusive playground at Woodlands Park follows in the footsteps of Bicentennial and Municipal parks, which were also replaced and re-opened earlier in June 2023.
The opening of Woodlands Park’s inclusive playground was two weeks ahead of schedule and represents the second inclusive park in Perrysburg (the first of which was Rotary Community Park, opened in August 2021). In addition to its new inclusive playground, the park offers visitors an 18-hole disc golf course, Sculpture Walk (an art exhibition open through August 2023), shelter house, picnic pavilion, walking path, and flower garden.
The funding source for new inclusive park equipment totaled 1.3 million, and was provided by American Rescue Plan Act funds. Reasons for updating park equipment included the age of original playground structures and the difficulty of finding replacement parts. Some of the old equipment from Woodlands Park was donated to Missions International of America, a 501(c)(3) organization that is working on a project to build a school playground in Haiti.
Throughout the upgrades and changes at Woodlands Park, one feature has remained consistent to preserve the history of the park: the original bricks that were laid when the playground first opened in 1997 were kept in place to commemorate the volunteers who helped build and develop a community fund to install Fort Imagination, one of the original playground structures in Woodlands Park.
To learn more about Woodlands Park, visit their website here. Woodlands Park, 429 East Boundary St., Perrysburg. 419-872-8020.
