5 Ways to Mitigate the Risk of Climbing Structures in Children’s Museums
Every organization that welcomes the public through its doors, especially children’s museums, worries about exposing itself and its guests to risk.
Unlike playgrounds, where we accept the occasional skinned knee or pinched finger, visitors to children’s museums often have very different expectations for guaranteed safety. Many people want every museum exhibit to be completely risk-free, however, accidents will always happen, no matter how careful we are.
As a museum leader, what do you do about this inevitability? Do you make your exhibits as bubble-wrapped and perceptively safe as possible? Or do you embrace the fact that risky play is a crucial part of children’s development, and have a plan in place to address accidents, should they occur?
I prefer the latter option.
When planning for a climbing experience at your venue, you are deciding that children need opportunities for bold adventure. A great climber shouldn't be easy; it should test your courage, stretch your abilities, and give you a new sense of self. The goal then is to provide for appropriate risk-taking while also pro-actively anticipating potential hazards, protecting the museum, its staff, and its guests. Most of this can be accomplished through excellent design and craftsmanship, safety and injury protocols, and appropriate insurance coverage.
Expert Design
Some initial things to consider: Knowing and following safety and ergonomic rules of thumbs, accounting for the safe distance someone can fall, ensuring gaps are sized so they prevent head and neck entrapment, and making sure structure elements are strong enough to support varied weight loads (from children to adults). An experienced designer of children’s play structures will address these elements in their design from the beginning. While one-of-a-kind climbing structures go far beyond the definition of playground equipment, many of these rules are codified through ASTM (American Society for Testing and Materials) standards and U.S. Playground Safety Guidelines.
2. Excellent Craftsmanship
When it comes time to build the structure, excellent craftsmanship becomes essential. Things like rounded edges, surfaces that aren’t splintery, and weld beads that aren’t sharp can go a long way toward a safer guest experience. Of course, structures must be built so that they’re strong and stable, as well as maintainable and cleanable. The builder must think critically about where little hands and bodies might like to go, and plan for as many scenarios as possible.
3. Safety Checks
For any exhibit that has a higher risk of visitor injury, you’ll need to develop a protocol for regular safety checks: Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Yearly. The staff, in collaboration with the fabricators, should come up with what these checks should be and how frequently they must occur. It may be that there are daily checks of certain elements; another level of checks every 6 months; and an even more thorough check annually.
For example, for Adventure Forest, an especially large and complex climber at the Children’s Museum of Denver, the lead fabricator put together a comprehensive manual on how and when to implement rigorous safety checks, extending to staff training when new employees were on-boarded. This is an extreme example, but it highlights how important this step is for mitigating risk. After all, even fast food playgrounds receive regular operational inspections and maintenance. Developing, following, and documenting regular safety checklists is an essential step toward mitigating injury risk.
4. Injury Protocols
Once your exhibit is open, someone will inevitably get hurt. When that happens, the museum must have a protocol in place for how they attend to that injury. This set of protocols should be in place well in advance of visitors using the structure or space. (This is especially important for emerging museums to note, as they may not have considered this important step yet.)
The protocols should include: making sure the person is ok; documenting how and where the incident happened; following up with the guest; then addressing the hazard (if there is one). Was this an aberrant injury situation, or could it potentially be reproduced by other guests? Assessing the level of severity can help the museum prioritize which hazards are addressed, how quickly, and by whom (the exhibits or facilities department, or the piece fabricator).
5. Insurance Coverage
Insurance is essential, of course. While you don’t want to let insurance dictate the design of an exhibit, you will want to bring your insurance company in to discuss the design intention of your new exhibit and the safety protocols and checklists you have in place. While it might seem that something like a climbing structure would necessitate a higher insurance premium based on its riskiness, this is often not the case. (It has been my experience that insurance premiums may rise as a result of a new climbing structure, not because of real or perceived risk, but because a museum has increased its built assets.)
Since we are not insurance experts or lawyers, we won’t go into too much detail here, but we do recommend speaking with other museums that are equally sized to learn more about any relevant insurance concerns or processes.
To Sum Up
When you build a climbing structure or any exhibit for that matter, it’s inevitable that injuries will happen. And when you’re dealing with a truly customized and unique structure that hasn’t existed in the world before, there are bound to be questions.
It’s crucial, however, to provide children with experiences that challenge their bodies and minds with elements of perceived risk and decision making, building character and a sense of self in a way that doesn’t happen in other daily experiences. Some small level of real risk is involved, but this can be mitigated through the thoughtful and proactive steps explained above.
