In Canada, daycare, school, commercial, and public playground surfaces need to meet fall height requirements. While these requirements help keep children safe while at play, the right playground surface can provide additional safety, helping to prevent falls and injuries. While gravel, wood fibre, and loose rubber are common choices at many Canadian playgrounds, they can easily become displaced and fail to provide the safety they were intended to. Using rubber tile flooring can provide a broader range of benefits, making for a more accessible playground that keeps children safe.
Considerations to Make When Choosing Playground Surfacing
When designing a playground and choosing the right surface, it’s important to think about more than just aesthetics. Here’s what to consider:
Safety & Comfort
First and foremost, the safety of playing children is a top priority when you’re choosing a playground surface. Playground rubber mats are usually the safest choice as they’re cushioned enough to absorb the impact of falls while providing a solid, slip-resistant surface for children to run on. These playground rubber tiles are available in a range of thicknesses to meet the fall height requirements of playground equipment, making them an ideal choice.
Accessibility
Inclusive, accessible playgrounds ensure that children of all abilities can play and have fun. Unfortunately, loose playground surfaces such as wood fibre, loose rubber, and gravel make it difficult for children in wheelchairs or other physical disabilities to access the playground. For this reason, many playground designers are opting for rubber tile flooring.
Aesthetics
While safety, comfort, and accessibility are important, you’ll still want to consider the appearance of your playground when choosing a surface. Children respond to visual stimuli and react positively to fun patterns and colours. The right playground surfacing can ensure that kids have a fun experience while playing in a safe environment.
The Benefit of PlaySafe Playground Rubber Mats
At Perfect Surfaces, we supply resilient rubber playground mats and playground rubber tiles in Canada. Made of porous, heavy-gauge rubber, our playground mats are shock-absorbent, slip-resistant, comfortable, and safe.
PlaySafe is one of the leading safety surface brands for its highly rated fall protection, durability, ease of installation, and versatility. PlaySafe rubber tile flooring is commonly used for indoor and outdoor playgrounds, daycares, gymnastics, and combat sports. Here are just a few of the benefits of investing in PlaySafe sports surfaces for your playground design:
Shock Absorption
PlaySafe playground surfaces can cushion or reduce the force of impact should children slip and fall while playing or running. Surfaces with low shock absorption, including loose playground surfaces, may result in worse injuries than those with high shock absorption.
Slip Resistance
Traction is important when choosing a playground surface. PlaySafe surfaces have a slip-resistant finish that delivers optimal traction and friction.
Stability
Not to be confused with slip resistance, stability is how the surface buckles under pressure. For example, a soft surface can result in injuries because it gives when subjected to weight. PlaySafe surfaces provide just the right amount of cushioning while ensuring the stable footing that kids need to pivot, run, rotate, and push off the surface.
Easy Maintenance
Flooring that’s easy to clean and maintain is a must when you’re operating a busy playground or gymnastics facility. To clean PlaySafe surfaces, simply sweep or vacuum debris and use warm water and a gentle cleanser when mopping.
Trust the Safety of PlaySafe Playground Rubber Tiles
Because most playground injuries occur due to falls, it’s vital to provide children with safe, cushioned playground flooring. PlaySafe’s rubber tile flooring and mats are designed specifically to protect children from dangerous falls. With flooring options that meet ASTM critical fall height requirements, PlaySafe rubber flooring is shock-absorbent, slip-resistant, and comfortable for kids to play on.
Perfect Surfaces is proud to supply PlaySafe flooring solutions in Canada. Contact us for more information on available products, pricing, and how to order.
