Remember. In America. Adults are not trusted to cross the road where they want. 😂

It's so weird that Americans see playground equipment as dangerous, but not guns.

When you live in the most litigious society in the world, you can get sued for breathing in the wrong direction! We dont wrap our children in bubble wrap, if you make a mistake, you learn from it and move on. Its not that difficult

British swings look like a torture device….. Me thinking USA swings look like medieval chastity belts

Over here in the UK, we don't have to sue the local Council to pay the medical bill if your child falls off of a piece of equipment at the park.

British playgrounds teach children to assess risk.

He missed out one important point. The surface of the playground is made from a soft boundary rubber. Which reduces serious injuries 😉

Its where we train our junior SAS

When we moved from Ohio to Wales in 2004, my teens were amazed at all the things they could do - jump off the sea wall, for example. There was a sign saying, basically, "Jumpers beware. You need to know the tides or the water will not be deep enough." I love to hike, and many coast paths in Wales run along very steep cliffs, sometimes crumbling in places due to erosion. So, you need to be aware of this and act accordingly. There was nowhere in the US that allowed teens - or adults - to assess risk for themselves. It seems ironic, in a country so obsessed with FREEDOM, that the freedom to make these kinds of decisions for yourself is practically non-existent.

Removing absolutely every element of risk for kids at play means that they never get to learn how to assess and manage physical risk. There have been risk-reducing changes in the UK over the years - some of the most dangerous equipment (the witches hat swing for example) has been replaced, and the surfaces below the equipment won't be concrete any more. But learning how to climb and use the equipment safely is a great lifeskill.

The black patches under the playground is not tarmac bitumen, it is a rubberised surface that really absorbs the kinetic motion of a kid's head to help prevent concussion

UK parents mantra, If you fall off that and break both your legs, don't come running to me.

A guide who takes Americans on hiking trips (in Europe) told me once that if a tree has fallen across the trail or they have to go across a little rough ground off trail, that most of the party would get stuck and couldn't figure out how to clamber around obstacles or traverse rough ground. It was like they had never developed the ability to walk on anything rougher than a relatively well kept trail. I wonder if an upbringing where they were never allowed to do anything remotely risky along with being ferried everywhere by car, may be the reason for this.

I don't have the figures to hand but I heard on a similar video comparing USA playgrounds to European ones that in fact ironically the injury rate in US playgrounds is actually higher! The theory is that in Europe children are encouraged to learn risk assessment. They have to think and be more cautious. Whereas in the USA the children are lead into a false sense of security and end up doing silly things, falling off and breaking a bone. I don't know if this is true but it makes sense. It reminds me of the fact that although people walk a lot less in the USA the pedestrian death rate is higher.

The funniest thing about those baby swings is when adults get in them and get stuck, then it becomes a torture device.

I think one thing missing here is Most UK parks have different play areas for different age groups, there is nearly always Toddler appropriate equipment, then areas for up to 12's and then some even have outdoor gyms for the teenagers and adults.

Now you know why we can play rugby without body armour. Training starts in the playground.

The UK doesn't have a sue culture as in America hence the more excitement and risk taking.

There are loads of safety features in UK playgrounds. They have to have special safety surfaces, so if a child falls they shouldn't hurt themselves. And there are several different styles of swing.

Does anyone remember the old metal horse rocker we used to have in UK playgrounds? We used to try to get it swinging so high it would get stuck upright. They were removed from playgrounds as they realised kids could trap their hands/limbs in it and it was really heavy and unforgiving! Happy days lol.

In my area (Cambridge UK) the equipment intended for toddlers and smaller children is within its own fenced off area to prevent toddlers running off and to prevent dogs coming in and messing on the grass. Equipment for older children does seem very unexciting compared with 50-60 years ago. In the 70's and 80's there seemed to be a lot of vandalisation of playground equipment for which reason a lot of it is now designed to be very strong/chunky and to my mind rather boring! I loved the very tall swings and big roundabouts that no longer seem to exist.

Kids swings are a torture device, if you are 15, drunk on white cider, and you try and force yourself in it. Your friends start pushing you and slapping your head. As you try to untangle yourself while moving and being slapped 😂

The UK toddler swing is literally a normal swing seat with some extra bits added on top to keep the toddler in the seat

what he fails to mention is the rides have a rubber compound ground covering so if they do fall it adsorbs the shock making for a softer landing so less chance of injury

I was a child in the 1950s and playgrounds didn't have as much as this. We had a merrygoround thing that was utter carnage. Usually an older child would come along and spin the thing really fast. Kids would go flying and the adults would just watch and laugh. Happy days.

My dad always said children will get themselves into danger no matter what and all we can do is teach them how to do it in a safe way.

My early years growing up in post WW2 East London. Our Adventure Playgrounds were the local Bomb Sites, and Epping Forest. No adult supervision whatsoever. We just went out to play, and told to be back in time for tea, or in winter, before it got dark! This was all before we moved out to the more salubrious Essex Estuary at 'Sarfend' when I was just 8 years old. Amazing how we managed to survive. I didn't suffer my first and only broken bone until I hit 50! 😂

As an American I think in the UK things are made out of metal because the weather there is cold and the worry of getting burned on hot metal isn’t a thing. I live in Southern California and right now in summer any metal playgrounds would burn the kids.

The UK added rubber ground around the dangerous play stuff, kept the dangerous equipment and made the ground softer instead……genius?

Worth noting that a lot of the older equipment was designed around the 70;s and 80's by people in their late 30's / early 40's who had been playing in bomb craters and abandoned buildings when they were kids. Likewise the people approving that stuff in the 20xx's are the same people who played on it when they were kids in the 80's.

I personally don’t think that making the equipment plastic is making it safer, especially not in the long term. Plastic can become brittle when exposed to the elements for long periods of time and as a result will split and break leaving very sharp edges. Where metal and wood can have maintenance routines in place to enhance the longevity and safety of the equipment. It’s also easier to make plastic dangerous through vandalism than it is the metal or wooden equipment that is more prevalent in many (if not most) UK playgrounds/swing parks. Of course there is also the impact on the environment from the plastic equipment too.

As someone living in England, not known anyone being seriously injured in a playground. It’s unheard of. Also it makes children think and understanding risk involved. There is more engagement between parent and child in activities! There is also fitness equipment in parks in UK which adults can use.

Merry-go-rounds here in the UK are called roundabout as in like the road, a merry-go-round would be a spinning circus ride with horses and things.

Lol when you said, hey kids get out the way, my turn. all i was thinking is that uk kids learning to take turns and queue to be on next ;)

The U.K. playgrounds may be riskier but they teach the kids to assess what risk they can handle at an early age.

Yes, similar merry go rounds here in the UK, which were once everywhere have been removed in recent years, as have large slides. But most now have rubberised flooring now, The British equipment was mostly wooden rather than metal. Climbing frames are quite common. Kids are meant to instil a sense of adventure, with an appreciation of risk, for kids to learn from. Really small children are not expected to play without adult supervision, while for older children self regulated risk is part of the fun of the place.

As a British boomer I can remember parents taking me to play parks and finding them boring. Us kids made our own fun. We built soap box carts and raced them. We hung ropes from trees and would swing over the river. We had secret air rifles and would have pitched battles in the woods (Mum thought I was ill with all the red marks on my body). A catapult was used to fire slugs and snails at girls. We built rafts to race across ponds. For rainy indoor days, adding the contents of a firework into Dad’s pipe tobacco was always fun. The important thing was that we were outdoors having real fun, not virtual.

Tyler. We used to have a roundabout called “The Witches Hat” a centre metal pole about 15ft high, suspended on it is a metal cone with rails used as hand holds coming down to a wooden seat ring at the bottom, you could either sit or stand on the wooden seat, plenty of handrails. It was great fun but a killer. Our park replaced it with a concrete sewer pipe about 3 ft in diameter and 8ft long, covered in concrete to keep it stable and good to climb over. One park in Cardiff has overcome people falling off a high slide. They built it on a grassy slope so that you slide down at speed but you can’t fall off.

Some UK parks have mini zip lines and a cup you sit on and spin until you throw up or fall

the UK child swings are especially dangerous to drunk adults getting stuck

No one gets sued if a child slides off the end of the slide. Kids learn safety, their boundaries. And yup, parental involvement is a good thing. Helicopter parenting isn’t. Our local park had a huge upgrade a few yrs back - most of the stuff is made of wood. There’s a zip line. All sorts of fun stuff. And kids are happily playing… We also now have more specialist swings for disabled kids in wheelchairs so they can join in.

The American baby swing looks like a kind of chastity belt. :)

I think the UK ones are safer than when I was a kid in the 1960s. All the surfaces under the swings, slides etc were concrete but I think now they use bark chips or some other soft material. The old metal slides would get red hot on sunny days.

Oh and btw - I survived some of the most dangerous playground structures like the ‘witches hat’ which are now long gone, and I’m still here! I fell off stuff. I learned.

You also get a sense of progression as they learn to play on the obstacles. First, you hold the child round the waist, then by one hand, and one day they do it all by themselves as you walk by the side, then later if you want you can add more fun back into it by racing them, adding a longer lifespan to the same playground equipment

The 'box/crate' swing for very small children, where the parent lifts them into it and pulls them up, out of it. It's designed for 2 to 4 yr olds - with parental supervision at all times. The kids don't get into it themselves, so it's a kind of 'safety' swing - even though it might not look it!

In the uk some kids play parks have gym equipment for adults an outdoor gym I use to go every day to use the out door gym equipment

Back when I was a kid in the 70s, the playgrounds were concrete and metal in England. Bruises and grazed knees were commonplace. The odd broken limb wasn't unheard of either 😂

My kids only go to the park with me and i will tell them if i think something is unsafe. Its called supervision. We used to have very large slides and unsafe merry go rounds (roundabout in the uk) and they removed and improved them. Now all the slides we have are safe. Even the big ones because they are made to slow you down before the end and even if you do go off the end the floor is really soft. Roundabouts now have seating and alot of of things to grab onto. And again we supervise to make sure they can handle how fast they are going

Those UK swings we saw at the beginning are toddler swings, there are also swings designed for older children and to some extent even adults because the swing construction is made out of metal, they can withstand more weight.

Its important not to make playgrounds super safe. Kids need to learn risk assessment, you cant do that if everything is bubble wrapped. My son fell off a spin ride when he was 4, he hurt his arm on the floor but he got up again went on and this time held onto the bars. Kids need to learn these things themselves. Making things super safe can have a negative effect honestly giving kids the impression that they can do anything without any consequence.

I have walked on many of these obstacle courses in parks here in the UK with my daughter. Purely for her benefit. Not because I was pretending I was Indiana Jones or anything 👀

rubber swing looks like a middle ages chastity belt to me

The one thing you are forgetting is that our kids are taught to think for themselves and we don't have to worry about being sued left right and centre! The floor around each item is made of a thick foam rubber and most of the world is trying to do away with plastics not using more !

Kids are tougher in the UK, we don't wrap our kids up in cotton wool and parents are more likely to participate with their kids. Only time adults are not welcome at a playground is if they have kids and the parents can join in, but it's still weird if there is an adult there without kids though Tyler.

I'm from England and some playgrounds are fantastic there is something for everyone even gym equipment for you to work out on.When I was a kid the playgrounds were so dangerous but great fun I never heard of anyone dying on one 😊

Back in the 70’s as a young teen in the U.K. we used to see how high we could go on the swings and launch ourselves off and try to cross the concrete surface and land in the sand pit. Once I miss judged my leap hitting the concrete and breaking my wrist, went home to mum and spent the rest of the summer holiday not being able to swim with my friends that was the only punishment needed to wise up. You learn from your mistakes wrapping kids in cotton wool doesn’t teach them anything risk has it’s reward you just have to learn to manage the risk

The risk in UK play grounds is constantly being reviewed and typically gets refurbished once a decade. The thing you have to remember is when you do a risk assessment you consider two factors: severity and likely hood. For example take using bark under play equipment, which is a bit springy to absorb force like a seat belt if you did fall, while the severity of a fall is lowered (fewer broken bones) it was found to cause too many splinters that could become infected. In this case bark is no longer used as the risk of splinters is higher than the gains of fewer broken bones. Last time I set foot in a playground they were using a flexible rubber to absorb the shock of a fall but I suspected that the risk of slipping when the ground is wet is slightly higher. You can't live without risk and I guess in America as others have pointed out the risk of liability to the local authority is higher in the USA. I remember my sister broke an arm falling off the school climbing frame but no one sued the school as it was an accepted risk. I guess it would be different if lots of kids were breaking bones but the occasional broken bone is worth the entertainment for children. In regards to spinning equipment it was my understanding that there was some sort of restriction that prevented them from spinning too fast these days.

It doesn't surprise me that UK playgrounds are more dangerous. After all, in the UK, we don't wear armour and prance around like fairies in order to play rugby or football.

The problem with the box-shaped swings here in the UK, is that teens/adults tend to get in them for fun or as a joke to their friends, and then can’t get their legs back out because it was just big enough to get in but then doesn’t have the leg room to get back out of it easily. Even for kids, it’s sometimes difficult to get out of them 😂 There is a park a couple minutes from where I live, and I’ve actually seen firemen turn up, after someone’s gotten stuck in it and had to call the fire department to get them out 😂 To help lower the risk of injury, most UK playgrounds have tarmac under the equipment or are on grass, so if a child does fall, it softens the impact in the same way mats do in gymnastics. Though, at the one I live near, the council keeps having to replace the tarmac because the kids like to vandalise it - I have literally seen people put clumps of the torn-up tarmac into their pockets and leave with it, as like a souvenir or something. One of the weirdest things I’ve seen.

Hi Tyler, I am from Mexico and also parents here used spend more time with their kids on playgrounds as sometimes the different items seemed dangerous so you we were kind of compelled to help or play with the kids to avoid an accident. Today most of playgorund parks are safer in terms of materials of construction bu then parents interaction is minimized.Another problem I have seen is that playgrounds are many times designed for different ages but brave toddlers scape from their parents supervision to dare a more interesting and challenging device! Best regards!

When I was a kid in the UK, swings and roundabouts had a concrete base they were fitted, but now there are safety mats on the concrete so they are a bit safer now

This little-child's swing, if you think about it, is just like an ordinary, older-child's swing but with a safety-rail around it. Take away the top rail and the posts and you've just got a regular, rectangular-seat swing that we're all familiar with, surely?

But they are okay with millions of guns.......

He's a big envious of uk parks,all the floors around each slide swing has to be soft rubber if they fall

It’s true in the Uk we play in the parks with our kids and grandkids ,we climb things with them hold their hands while they do obstacle courses and climbing nets and and the assorted round about sand spinners ,it’s a lot of fun for us all.

I remember those high metal slids that had about 6x 45° hip breakers as we called them as a kid, those were the days 😂😂

The American swing looks like its from a disabled facility. you scrub your knees you learn not to fall over. Unless you enjoy picking the scabs off.🤣 Also if you adequately supervise your kids they should be safe. You dont let a 3-4 year old go on the merry-go-round with a group of teens.

When I was a kid, you'd find _death slides_ in a lot of places in England. These are slides that are really tall and quickly taper off to a almost completely vertical drop (about an 80degree angle) until the bottom which quickly curves you out of the free fall. They are extremely fast and if you push off too hard from the top you could literally just miss the slide and crash to the bottom. They were designed to be used while riding in a burlap sack, but some people would try without one and nearly~ (or actually) break a leg at the bottom. The sack was necessary to ride the curve at the bottom.

Kids naturally want to climb and swing from things learning their capabilities and how to interact with their environment. Testing themselves against their friends etc. This is far safer to do within a playground than on that wall next to the road or trees overhanging the river. Though I did that too when my parents weren't around although I already understood my abilities to some extent. and yes having learnt to swim.

If a British child tales a tumble and breaks a bone, there will be no medical costs- same in most of Europe, so no need to sue. Most public playgrounds are designed by experts with adequate safety features, and maintained by local councils. Children are far likelier to get hurt playing in their own gardens on swings or other kit erected by their dad!

Army training for toddlers 💪😂

I grew up in the 80s in Britain, and we had the roundabouts with rail to hold and the flat base, and some spun more freely than others. We would run on the base of the loosest ones over and over a few steps at a time to get it spinning faster and faster to the point it was humming. It was incredibly dangerous for those younger kids sat in the middle that would sometimes out, the bigger kids running on it that would loose their footing and the idiots like me doing "flyers" by trying to grab onto the hand rail and spin with your legs at 90 degrees.

they sre also better for kids for training balance and motor skill

Jesus that guy would have had a heart attack if he saw our parks in the 70’s

My local playground (UK) has a wooden structure about 12 feet high that kids jump off onto a crash mat. Has rope swings and zip lines. Has a supervised area with hammers, axes & saws that kids can do woodwork in. Has tunnels made from indistrial plastic tubing kids can run through. Kids are encouraged to create things with scrap wood, metal and rubber tyres. They roll around inside plastic barrels. This is a supervised park with first aiders on hand but it is very much about encouraging imaginitive play, independent risk assesment and creativity. Its so popular that during school holidays on sunny days they often have to impose time limits as thry have people queuing waiting to get in with their children. Its Great fun

In the 1950s, in the UK when I was a child climbing the steps up the big slide was like climbing Mount Everest. But the best was the Witches Hat roundabout, that was belly trembling 😆

Born in the ‘fifties, here. We lived two or three streets away from an immense park in the north of England. When I was three or four years old, I’d wander off to the park - by myself - and head for the playground which was a couple of hundred yards from the main gate. The path to the playground crossed over a stream, which was also great fun to play in, weather permitting. We’d build dams and race paper boats and generally goof around. At the playground, I’d usually run into other kids of my age, and older, who were also there by themselves. We rarely saw adults unless they were there bringing very young toddlers in to play on the ‘baby swings’ which were the wooden milk-crate type and were almost impossible to get into unaided. The other swings were A framed wooden-slab-types, mounted in two banks of three and suspended on chains. They got a lot of use, unless some yob had managed to loop one over the cross bar so it hung too high to be reachable. The floor was concrete, everywhere. Character-building, concrete. There was an all-metal slide which was, I guess, around nine feet tall. We’d polish it with (then) waxed bread wrappers to get extra speed. It was an achievement to shoot right off the end of it. It had, I think, twenty or twenty-one cast iron steps, all with Wicksteed, Kettering cast into the design. It had a slatted wooden ’hut’ on top and to a three year old, it was daunting. First time I ever went up it, I came back down the steps. The climbing frame was rectangular and built of steel tubing, taller in the middle (four squares high) than around the periphery, which was three squares high. it was quite difficult to get to the top - a big stretch between levels. The tubing could be played like a didgeridoo if you could find an open end that hadn’t been stuffed with bubble-gum - or worse. Multi-seat, cast iron rocking horse, with, I think, five seats in tandem, each with a grab rail on the back. The horse’s head also had a grab rail for the front rider. There was a long running board along each side and the whole thing had an independent pivoting mechanism near the front and back. It was possible to stand alongside the thing and work it hard enough get it to pitch violently. I don’t remember anybody ever getting thrown, or getting hit under the chin by it. Bizarrely, there was a set of parallel bars. The rails were steel-cored wood, with no real flexibility and they were very difficult to climb onto. Again, mounted above very hard concrete. I vaguely remember a see-saw, ideal for cracking heads like nuts. It disappeared early on, probably about 1956-8. The centrepiece of the playground was the roundabout, made of a wooden floor, divided into six segments by heavy steel rails running horizontally from the central axle, which was topped by a ball-shaped, cast iron finial. The rails then smoothly turned into verticals which went down to the edge of the wooden disk floor. A diagonal bar ran from the top centre to the outside vertical just above the floor, so it was impossible to climb under the rails. All the metalwork was done in brightly coloured (presumably) lead paint. It lasted for years. Most people liked the roundabout running anti-clockwise. Anyone who set it off running clockwise (the ’sick’ way) was regarded as some sort of psychopath. We all tried it at some point, but most hated it and it went back to anti-clockwise. The basic use was to stand on the floor and then pass the outside corner of the rails from hand to hand, speeding up the rotation until it was spinning as a blur - and then to try to get on to the impossibly fast vehicle and to hang on for dear life - or, if you were a hard nutter, to go no-hands, leaning into the centre to counteract the centrifugal force. This was about the time of Sputnik, which led to a bunch of under five year-olds arguing about whether we were experiencing centrifugal or centripetal force. The consensus (wrong) was that ‘the sick way’ was centripetal, the ‘right way’ was centrifugal. A little knowledge (and misunderstanding programmes on The Wireless’s Home Service) - is a dangerous thing. Fifty years later I took my young daughter on a trip around my old stamping ground. All the old equipment had gone, replaced by plasticky, unchallenging slab-sided apparatus, none of it very high, none of it having much play value. The floor had areas of rubber “tarmac” around any piece of gear. There was a slide of sorts, with a nothing of a slope and a height most kids could have jumped from, and the swings were…. lame. It was heartbreaking. No parallel bars, no bucking rocking horse - no fun. She played for less than half an hour, but by then she had exhausted all the possibilities and was bored. I couldn’t help but think of the hundreds of hours I’d spent in there. Different times, different outlooks, different everything.

I fell backwards off a swing when I was a child and smacked my head on the ground this was years ago before the modern swing seats.

At least our swings don’t look like medieval chastity belts 😂

since I was a kid in the UK the big change has been in the flooring, it used to be concrets or tarmac - that has all been removed and replaced by a more shock absorbent surface - to reduce the risk of injury

In the UK we accept that cuts and bruises happen. it is part of growing up. I think UK playgrounds are more stimulating. Adults here do get more involved in watching our kids at playgrounds and even if we do want to sit on the bench with the other parents, all of the equipment is built on top of a soft rubber mat so they will be fine. I am now starting to see more playgrounds made of wood in the UK.

I was a kid in the 60s and 70s, and when we fell off, we landed on either red ash or tarmac. What we have done in the UK since then is provide softer surfaces to land on. If kids are going to run around and play, they will fall. That's just part of outdoor play. Also, much of the play is communal - see saws, roundabouts, etc. I feel the whole "adventure playground" concept would blow your mind!

in the uk we fall and like "let's do it again" 🤣

I came dangerously close to breaking my nose in a British playground when I was about 6

When I was a child, safe meant boredom. Risky equated to adveturous. Huge adventure playgrounds with zip lines, balance beams 8 feet off the ground and rope bridges. Slides attached to a large steel covered dome with a fireman's pole in the centre. if you fell from the top you could be hurt very badly. So we chose to ignore the slide itself and slide down the dangerous outer covering of the dome. Life was good.

My favourite thing from the 1970s playground was the witches hat. The chutes we had were at least double the height of current ones and of course the we didn't have the soft bouncy ground, we had gravel usually interspersed with chips of glass. No health and safety in those days. At the biggest park in our area they had something called the cheesecutter which I was always too scared to go on.

Used to have tall and long slides here in the U.K. when I was a kid back in the 1970’s and 80’s, and the only thing to break your fall if you feel of the top of the slide, was a Tarmac/Asphalt or cement floor.

Its not about safety, its about litigation. Why take responsibility for looking after your child when you can just sue somebody else?

(UK) There's a newer (actually been there for years) section to my local park's playground and it's mostly made from a hard-ish plastic, it has less metal which is good but I don't think the safety of it is any different to the older section of the playground. There's a new spinny thing that at times is hard to hold onto but instead of a disc of metal its a plastic donut shape, though I scraped my knee using it as a teen so maybe not the safest for kids. Theres also the climbing frame which doesn't have much netting to stop a chid from falling off. Softplays are definitely safer in that sense, with the netting and cushioned frames and flooring.

Where I live in the uk is a small town and growing up it had 3 parks that were all tailored to different ages…. Yes there were general swings and slides at all 3 but there was a toddler/young kid one with small equipment and then a junior school one with slightly more advanced equipment and then a bigger one for older children and teens where they could ride bikes aswell as play on swings, climb and do monkey bars etc….. it worked well as families could go to any as all had a swing and a slide but children/groups of kids could meet up and be independent too.

I've noticed this a lot and I've noticed it in myself even is because the equipment is bigger and more dangerous it's more likely to encourage an adult to play with their kids on the playground equipment - now that is an interesting point.. that's a huge advantage for the child imo

British baby swings are exactly the same design as older child swings, except with uprights. The flat rectangular bottom is identical!

When I was in primary school we had these massive ropes that went down from the ceiling wich was like 10-15 meters tall wich we would usually climb up and swing on. Now that I think about it those ropes weren’t that safe but they were bloody fun.

I've noticed some things being removed in some UK parks near me but I think they've just been breaking after years of no maintenance. The notable one are a number of the zip lines don't have the seat on them, and some spinny bowl kinda things vanished (you'd sit in it and it could spin and tilt, was usually quite difficult to get out on your own) Lots of parks have some form of split between two areas, one clearly for younger audiences and one for older (there's no rules, just vibes) and the more advanced area can easily continue to be fun for adults. The thing noted at 9:10, yep, you just try to hold onto it for as long as possible while it spins! It's a decent challenge, and usually out of the reach of younger people.

I used to put a blanket in the swings when mine were babies. The equipment is safe as long as used correctly. I have a son and daughter with autism they have never been injured. Yes we do sometimes have to show them what to do. You have to have a go on the zipwire it's the law. We have a beautiful Victorian park where I live. Most the bigger slides are tube slides now to prevent children falling off. I preferred the old style seesaws. But the modern equipment is definitely safer than when i was a child. Definitely more inclusive for SN's. Not much for children with physical disabilities sadly. There was some American style swings when i went to Butlins i was about 10. Weren't comfortable to sit on impossible to swing. I didn't like them.

Swings in the UK are quite lethal lol, they can go up and over the top with enough power. Most UK kids from seaside towns learn to swim at a very young age, and just hangout at the beach, that has far more risk than any playground.

My dad built the original adventure playground in Holland Park, London. You’d better believe it was dangerous and fantastic. You had a seperate area called the 1 O’clock Club for little ones with their own play equipment, and the adventure area for the bigger kids. I adored the zip line with was a properly big one with two different heights of platform. Maaaan that thing got some speed up! Anecdote - my parents were friends with Alan Rickman before he became famous,he used to help out at the play park with them!

The vast majority of UK children's play areas have soft flooring, or woodchip, so if the child does make a mistake, they'll learn to be more careful, but reduce the risk of injury.

I'm 51 years old and I can tell you with full confidence that if you think todays British playgrounds are "risky", you have never had a pirate ship kiss, a witches hat hug or a dog mess landing from a 15 foot urinal shoot heated to the temperature of the sun, ice frozen or soaking wet death slide being tempted to go see some puppys and given bitter sweets from someone's uncle in a full length rain coat :o/