Snap! Ka-Ching! Park Slope Kids Break Legs; Parents Sue

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Break a leg, kids! Nope, it’s not theater talk encouragement before your kid’s stage production of There Will Be Blood, it’s what’s been happening at Slope Park, the 6^th Avenue and 18^th street playground.

The south slope playground reopened this summer after it’s planned springtime opening was postponed due to many obstacles including a design change, damaged pipes and contractor delays. After the $2 million renovation was finally complete, it opened to the crunching sound of children’s bones breaking, followed closely by the rumbling of a trail of lawyers and lawsuits.

At least eight kids have snapped their foot on the mat surface underneath the too-low-to-the-ground Oodle Swing causing injury or broken bones. The results have been casts and crutches and lawsuits against the manufacturer of the swing as well as the Parks Department.

The Parks Department had the evil swing removed. The Oodle Swing will be replaced with a net climber because everyone knows children climbing to great heights never get injured. 

My children are only allowed to play on playground equipment if they are wearing a helmet, a suit of armor and a mouth guard. I will only accompany them to local playgrounds after I put emergency room and personal injury attorney phone numbers in my iPhone Favorites. My fragile precious kids are not permitted to play on anything less than 2 feet and no more than 3 feet off the ground. The result is that my children have never once been injured on the playground. Why, yes, they have suffered heat stroke in the summer due to the weight of the armor and I’m sure they have been emotionally injured by the taunts that come from their protective garb…but no broken bones. What about their emotional angst as a result of my helicopter parenting? They’ll just work that out in therapy when they are older, after they put me in a crappy senior living facility. 

Have you ever watched kids swing on an Oodle swing, carefree, laughing, bones snapping? Do you prefer that children stay safely inside playing Grand Theft Auto and Mortal Kombat? FIPS wants to know. 

VIA DNAINFO.COM