Terminology
  • Accessible Route: a pathway designed to ensure access for individuals with disabilities, including wheelchair or mobility device users.
  • Adjacent Platforms: two platforms that share a common vertical plane but differ slightly in height.
  • Rotating Equipment: any play structure designed to support the weight of users, rotating around an axis at various angles and intended for repetitive rotation. This category includes equipment like merry-go-rounds, whirls, log rolls, and spinners, but excludes sand diggers, steering wheels, and other manipulative components.
  • Rung: a horizontal bar in a ladder or climbing equipment that supports the user’s feet or hands.
  • Sharp Edge: an edge capable of cutting the user's skin.
  • Sharp Point: a point that can puncture or lacerate the user’s skin during use.
  • Signal Word: a word indicating a specific level of hazard.
  • Small Part: a detachable object that poses a choking, aspiration, or ingestion risk.
  • Stability: the ability of playground equipment to resist forces that could tip or slide it when properly installed.
  • Accessible: describes a part of playground equipment that is reachable, usable, or both, by individuals with disabilities.
  • Accessible Playground: an area with playground equipment that offers various play opportunities for users of different abilities and is designed to be entered and approached as a whole.
  • Stair: a structure with a slope of 50° or less, consisting of a series of steps for ascending or descending.
  • Stationary Equipment: play structures with a fixed base that do not move.
  • Step: the flat part of a stair or ladder where the foot is placed, also known as a tread.
  • Stepping Forms: elevated, standalone devices that aid in balance and can serve as access points.
  • Transfer Point: a platform designed to facilitate the transfer of a child from a wheelchair onto the equipment.
  • Trip Hazard: an unexpected elevation change that is not clearly visible, posing a risk of tripping.
  • Upper Body Equipment: overhead components designed solely for hand support, such as horizontal ladders and ring ladders.
  • Use Zone: the area under and around play equipment, intended for safe movement and expected landings from the equipment, free of obstacles and compliant with impact attenuation standards.
  • Swing: a seat or element suspended from a structure allowing movement in one or multiple planes, with a pivot point above 24 inches.
  • Swing Bay: the area under a swing's overhead beam, supported by structural elements.
  • Track Rides: play components that glide along a track with enclosed rolling mechanisms.
  • Warning: a notification of potential danger that could lead to serious injury or death if not heeded.
  • Climbing Net Structure: flexible climbing grids or matrices used as playground equipment.
  • Completely Bounded Opening: an opening in play equipment completely enclosed by its boundaries.
  • Component: a part of a play structure that facilitates specific activities and is not standalone.
  • Composite Play Structure: multiple linked play structures forming a single unit offering various activities.
  • Crush And Shear Point: a juncture where injuries like contusions, lacerations, or fractures can occur.
  • Designated Play Surface: an elevated or flat surface intended for various activities, with specific size and angle requirements.
  • Embankment Slide: a slide that follows the terrain with a chute height not exceeding 12 inches above the ground.
  • Enclosed Swing Seat: a swing with fixed supports around and between the user’s legs to prevent falls.
  • Entanglement: a condition where clothing or objects around the neck catch on equipment.
  • Entrapment: a situation where a body part is stuck after penetrating an opening.
  • Handrail: a rigid bar that aids balance and support along pathways.
  • Head Injury Criteria (Hic): a metric evaluating impact severity based on deceleration and pulse duration.
  • Maximum User: a measurement based on a 12-year-old child at the 95th percentile for size.
  • Minimum User: a measurement based on a 2-year-old child at the 5th percentile for size.
  • Fall Height: the vertical distance from a play surface to the protective surface below.
  • Flexible Component: a part of playground equipment that alters shape during use, such as nets or bridges.
  • Functionally Linked Play Structure: a play structure designed as a continuous play unit, regardless of physical attachment.
  • G: the acceleration due to gravity at sea level, quantified as 32 ft/s² (9.8 m/s²).
  • Guardrail: a barrier preventing falls from elevated surfaces.
  • Partially Bounded Opening: an opening in play equipment not fully enclosed by its boundaries.
  • Platform: a flat area designed for multiple users to stand and move freely.
  • Play Structure: a freestanding structure with multiple components and supporting members.
  • Preventive Maintenance: a program of regular inspections and maintenance to ensure proper equipment function and prevent failures.
  • Protective Surfacing: materials within the use zone meeting specific impact attenuation standards for safety.
  • Professional Judgment: the informed opinion or decision-making capability of an expert in playground design or operation based on their experience and knowledge.
  • Public Use Playground Equipment: play structures intended for public areas like schools, parks, and restaurants.
  • Rocking/Springing Equipment: structures that rock on a fixed base, enhancing play dynamics.
  • Barrier: An enclosing device around an elevated platform that is intended to prevent both inadvertent and deliberate attempts to pass through the device.
  • Composite Structure: Two or more play structures attached or functionally linked, to create one integral unit that provides more than one play activity.
  • Critical Height: The fall height below which a life-threatening head injury would not be expected to occur.
  • Designated Play Surface: Any elevated surface for standing, walking, crawling, sitting or climbing, or a flat surface greater than 2 inches wide by 2 inches long having an angle less than 30° from horizontal.
  • Embankment Slide: A slide that follows the contour of the ground and at no point is the bottom of the chute greater than 12 inches above the surrounding ground.
  • Entanglement: A condition in which the user’s clothes or something around the user’s neck becomes caught or entwined on a component of playground equipment.
  • Entrapment: any condition that impedes withdrawal of a body or body part that has penetrated an opening.
  • Fall Height: The vertical distance between the highest designated play surface on a piece of equipment and the protective surfacing beneath it.
  • Footing: A means for anchoring playground equipment to the ground.
  • Full Bucket Seat Swing: A swing generally appropriate for children under 4 years of age that provides support on all sides and between the legs of the occupant and cannot be entered or exited without adult assistance.
  • Geotextile (Filter) Cloth: A fabric that retains its relative structure during handling, placement, and long-term service to enhance water movement, retard soil movement, and to add reinforcement and separation between the soil and the surfacing and/or sub-base.
  • Guardrail: An enclosing device around an elevated platform that is intended to prevent inadvertent falls from the elevated surface.
  • Infill: Material(s) used in a protective barrier or between decks to prevent a user from passing through the barrier (e.g., vertical bars, lattice, solid panel, etc.).
  • Loose-Fill Surfacing Material: A material used for protective surfacing in the use zone that consists of loose particles such as sand, gravel, engineered wood fibers, or shredded rubber.
  • Preschool-Age Children: Children 2 years of age through 5 years of age.
  • Projection: Anything that extends extends outward from a surface of the playground equipment and must be tested to determine whether it is a protrusion or entanglement hazard, or both.
  • Protective Surfacing: Shock absorbing (i.e., impact attenuating) surfacing material in the use zone that conforms to the recommendations in §2.4 of this handbook.
  • Protrusion: A projection which, when tested, is found to be a hazard having the potential to cause bodily injury to a user who impacts it.
  • Roller Slide: A slide that has a chute consisting of a series of individual rollers over which the user travels.
  • School-Age Children: Children 5 years of age through 12 years of age.
  • Slide Chute: The inclined sliding surface of a slide. Stationary Play Equipment — Any play structure that has a fixed base and does not move.
  • Supervisor: Any person tasked with watching children on a playground. Supervisors may be paid professionals (e.g., childcare, elementary school or park and recreation personnel), paid seasonal workers (e.g., college or high school students), volunteers (e.g., PTA members), or unpaid caregivers (e.g., parents) of the children playing in the playground.
  • Toddlers: Children 6 months through 23 months of age. Tube Slide — A slide in which the chute consists of a totally enclosed tube or tunnel.
  • Unitary Surfacing Material: A manufactured material used for protective surfacing in the use zone that may be rubber tiles, mats, or a combination of energy absorbing materials held in place by a binder that may be poured in place at the playground site and cures to form a unitary shock absorbing surface.
  • Upper Body Equipment: Equipment designed to support a child by the hands only (e.g., horizontal ladder, overhead swinging rings).
  • Use Zone: The surface under and around a piece of equipment onto which a child falling from or exiting from the equipment would be expected to land. These areas are also designated for unrestricted circulation around the equipment.