Officials with the City of Red Bank invite the public to a ribbon cutting ceremony on Tuesday, April 19th, for the opening of the city’s new playground. The celebration will begin at 2pm at the Joe Glasscock Red Bank Community Center located at 3653 Tom Weathers Drive.
The newly constructed playground was a project championed by the Red Bank City Commission and Public Works Director Greg Tate. The desire was to build the playground at the Community Center, but the location had its challenges. Space was limited due to underground utilities, slope and size of open space in relation to playground fall zones and natural terrain.
In August 2021, after assessing the site’s challenges, Tate began the initial procurement of the playground equipment. Several sealed bids were turned in to the city with the best priced, best sized structure for the area being presented from Firefly Recreation, a Knoxville, TN area recreational equipment supplier. The play features themselves were constructed by Columbia Cascade, a nationwide recreational equipment builder from Washington State.
The entire playground, the sidewalk and the picnic tables are all ADA compliant, making access available to everyone. The new playground was funded in part by the Red Bank/Soddy Daisy Fund (approximately 30%) and was sourced and partially built by the City of Red Bank Public Works employees. The actual playground structures were constructed in place by Hammer Down Recreation, a licensed, certified playground builder.
“As the process evolved, it was turned over to Public Works Operations Foreman Justin Headrick for management of the grade work, pavilion construction, sidewalk construction, features build, electrical work, sign replacement, mulch and landscape work,” said Tate. “I would also like to offer my appreciation to Johnny Ledford, John Nash, Clay Boydston, Joshua Loveless, Scott Johnson, Ryan Coleman and Ron Clark of the Public Works Department for their contributions to the project.”
For more information about the playground and the ribbon cutting ceremony, contact Red Bank City Hall at 423-877-1103.