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Biddeford, Maine
The City of Biddeford is proud to announce the upcoming revitalization of the grounds surrounding the historic J.R. Martin Community Center. Long dedicated to fostering community engagement and serving as a welcoming hub for local residents, the center currently houses the city’s thriving after-school program, which supports over 100 students.
This project aims to transform the area into a true destination park for the entire Biddeford community. Planned improvements include new walking paths, picnic tables, dedicated green space, and a fully updated playground designed to serve children of all ages and abilities.
Groundbreaking is scheduled for mid-August, with a celebratory ribbon cutting anticipated in mid-September. The City is incredibly excited to provide residents with an inclusive, accessible, and vibrant outdoor space where everyone can connect, play, and thrive.
As part of the revitalization of your community parks, the existing central walkway and outdated playground equipment will be fully removed and the site leveled to make way for a dynamic, inclusive new play environment. The current fencing will also be replaced, with new secure fencing enclosing the entire playground to create a safer environment for families with young children or elopers. Color pallet will be orange and teal for the play equipment.
A stone dust walking path will loop around the playground, offering a pleasant walking route with clear sightlines for caregivers. Throughout the space, scattered picnic tables, benches, and repurposed granite from the original park will provide ample seating and nod to the site’s history.
The redesigned playground will feature two distinct play areas. The main structure will combine classic favorites like monkey bars and slides with a large rope climber and a geometric cube climber. The rope climber serves as a freeform play structure, encouraging children of all ages to explore and engage creatively. The geometric climber offers a challenging and adventurous ascent through interconnected play cubes, leading to an elevated slide. Inside select ground-level cubes, sensory panels will offer calming and tactile features, providing an inclusive space for children who need a quiet moment or sensory break.
The second play area is designed for younger children, with a smaller structure featuring double slides and a climber to help build confidence and support progression to the larger structure. Swinging basket seats in this area offer versatile and inclusive vestibular play, supporting children with limited trunk control while providing sensory-rich movement experiences for all users.
A tiger cub climber will serve as both a playful climbing feature and a tribute to Biddeford’s after-school program. Surfacing throughout the playground will be a combination of rubber and engineered mulch—balancing accessibility for mobility devices with a natural look that blends with the surrounding green space and stone dust path.
As an accessible multi-user swing the basket swing is a great inclusive piece. Basket swings encourage cooperation among children. The basket seat allows for many children standing, laying or seated and is inclusive for all.
Basket seats can help develop balance, coordination and spatial awareness. Rhythm and thinking skills are also engaged.
The IKO consists of an outer frame and ropes rigged within that outer frame, forming a spatial net. As the IKO's design allows freedom of expression and creativity, offering infinite options while playing and climbing. The IKO is easy-care and low-maintenance and has huge play value.
Rope play is excellent for the development of motor skills, muscle development and improving balancing skills. As rope is a flexible material that moves slightly when you use it, it constantly challenges the children as they climb, and every action on the part of the structure has a reaction in another part. You will often see children, including older children in secondary schools, sitting and chatting in amongst the ropes of a structure, showing the social and interactive benefits of rope play
Based on the groundbreaking design of prominent architect/designer Richard Dattner, PlayCubes® offer rich physical, social and cognitive play value – with refreshingly fun ways to engage. This distinctive geometric shape invites interpretation, imagination and exploration – along with climbing in, on and through – for a totally unique, immersive play experience. Whether a space ship, a seed pod, or a mini-clubhouse, PlayCubes turn the smallest spaces into opportunities to imagine, climb, meet, hide, or relax. Refresh an existing playground or add new sculptural play in unexpected places
