Playground to be disassembled after safety audit
By Kari Barrows
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ASHEVILLE, North Carolina (WLOS) — A playground near an Asheville school will be torn down after it ranked 14.7 out of 100 in a safety inspection.
Asheville City Schools says Jones Park Playground near Ira B. Jones Elementary School has been closed to all students and community members since Aug. 24 following the unsatisfactory safety inspection from a third-party consultant.
The school district says the safety audit shows “the cost to make improvements to the current structure would be more than 50% of the replacement cost and exceeds ‘the added useful life of this play equipment.'”
“Therefore, fixing the playground as it currently stands is neither fiscally responsible nor an option Asheville City Schools would like to pursue,” the district said in a press release.
On Monday, Sept. 20, a maintenance team will be disassembling the wooden structure as the district’s next step in eventually replacing the playground.
The bricks and plaques will be saved and taken to the Ira B. Jones campus for safekeeping and cleaning. In the future, they will be available for purchase as a keepsake.
Once the playground is removed, there will be a green space in its place for students, families and the community.
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