Proposed playground delves into city's past

The front half of the proposed playground at the El Rancho parking lot in the city's downtown area would depict some of the city's most prominent buildings as they looked between 1890 and 1940. If approved, the small-scale town would span 70 feet in length and 12 feet in height.

Looking to draw more people into Mountain Home's downtown area, the city parks and recreation department hopes to turn part of the El Rancho parking area into a place where children can play and adults can learn more about the history of this community.

The proposed project involves building a miniature version of Mountain Home that would look similar in appearance to a Hollywood movie set.

The project is similar in appearance to miniature, western-style towns in other communities. However, the one planned for Mountain Home would take it a step further by keeping it historically accurate while making it a place where children can play.

The exterior of these small-scale buildings would depict a specific business or historic landmark in Mountain Home. On one side, people would see how buildings in Mountain Home looked between 1890 to 1940 while the other side shows how other buildings in town looked after 1940.

Local artist Marcus Mashburn designed the prototype model of the proposed playground, which covers nearly the entire surface of a standard dining room table. However, the actual playground would be much larger, spanning 70 feet in length and 12 feet in height with an eight-foot hallway in between both sets of building fronts.

Pending final approval by city officials, the playground would stand on an existing concrete pad at the downtown parking area. This would make it accessible to children and adults to include, most important, those who struggle to walk or are confined to a wheelchair.

"The concept of the El Rancho parking area was to make it a destination so that we would be attracting people to downtown," said city parks and recreation director Stan Franks. "So we've been gradually adding things down there."

In recent years, the parking area near the underpass has become home to a vintage fire truck, returned a city business landmark to the local skyline while adding displays highlighting the city's historic past.

The playground that Franks and his team have envisioned would take this a step further.

The miniature town concept came about because the Mountain Home doesn't have what Franks called a "creative-style playground" -- a designated place where children can play and pretend they are someone from the city's past such as a sheriff, a blacksmith or a desperado.

Currently, all of our playgrounds in town are what he called "active" versions where children can climb, slide or swing. While the city's playgrounds technically comply with federal guidelines in the Americans With Disabilities Act, this proposed playground would accommodate all people, he said.

Franks hopes to include additional play areas in front of the miniature buildings such as a teepee or pioneer wagon. Other cities have already incorporate these types of ADA-compliant features to accommodate entire families or those whose disabilities keep them from being able to play on a swing or slide.

Franks mentioned one community park that has a swing set large enough to fit an entire family and includes a way to let people in wheelchairs join in on the fun. The city disguised the swing to look like a vintage snow sleigh to help fuel children's imaginations.

"It has the opportunity to be a really cool attraction," Franks said. "It'll meet the needs that we don't have right now.

But the miniature village would also emphasize the city's ties to southern Idaho's pioneer past. Between the two walls of each "building," crews would install signs highlighting the community's history as part of a walking tour for visitors.

To make construction faster and a lot cheaper, parks and recreation would fashion the exterior of these small-scale buildings out of sign boards. Parks and recreation crews would cut the panels to the correct size, add in the window frames, swinging doors and other major features.

The panels would then be sent to Mashburn's workshop, where he would then go in and paint each one in historically accurate paint and other details.

"We designed it so we could build it in a shop and have the store fronts painted on and then install it down (at the parking lot) and then add the accessories later on," Franks said.

While a majority of the work would happen in house, the parks and recreation team would still need to hire a contractor to install the frames that would eventually hold those painted sign boards.

Work on the playground idea was put on hold last month after the city swimming pool opened, which drew away a considerable amount of people and resources to run that facility each day. However, Franks expects the project will being moving forward by this winter when things in his department slow down.

Depending on whether the mayor and city council support the effort, Franks hopes that the city's urban renewal district will help provide a portion of the funding to make this playground happen since it "fits their mission perfectly," he said.

In addition, the small-scale town would draw people's attention when driving up through the underpass or driving along Main Street, where it'll be clearly visible from both vantage points, according to Franks.

The parks and recreation director envisions turning the playground into an attraction that will not only draw in people who already live here but attract visitors that visit Mountain Home every day.

"I'm very excited about it. We can tie in a lot of history of Mountain Home," he said.