Playgrounds on school sites

Your school is responsible for providing playground equipment. This includes:

• designing and building works
• maintaining and upgrading playgrounds.

Most playgrounds are owned by the school board, and new playgrounds are built using board funding.

If you’re planning to build or upgrade a playground at your school, you can choose your own playground design and equipment as long as:

• the design meets 'New Zealand Standard 5828:2015 Playground equipment and surfacing'
• the building work follows our project management requirements.

You can buy a copy of the standard and the General Playground Equipment and Surfacing Handbook, which gives advice on standards compliance, from Standards New Zealand.

Playground equipment and surfacing – Standards New Zealandopen_in_new

General Playground Equipment and Surfacing Handbook – Standards New Zealandopen_in_new

Building consent for new playgrounds

You or your project manager should contact your local council to find out whether your planned playground needs building consent. Even if it doesn’t, you must still:

• get this advice in writing from the council
• keep a record of the advice provided in your project file for future reference.

Choosing the right playground equipment

There are different types of playground equipment available. Some are high risk, like trampolines, BMX tracks and skate tracks.

When deciding what type of equipment to install, consider whether it will affect your ability to provide a safe environment for your students.

We may provide access to a playground or playing field for students or staff with accessibility needs. This could include installing a ramped path for wheelchair access.

However, we don’t provide funding for modifications to existing playground equipment, such as:

• installing a wheelchair swing
• adding ramps and rails to a fort or climbing equipment.

You’ll need to use board funding to pay for modifications.

Funding for accessibility in schools

If you used board funding to build a playground at your school, you must also use board funding to maintain it or do any rebuilding or upgrades.

But, if we funded and own a playground at your school, you can use NZSPA or board funding to upgrade and maintain it.

You can use your 5 Year Agreement (5YA) funding for work on playgrounds that we own as long as the work is a capital project. Most work is considered a priority 4 project unless it’s addressing health and safety issues.

For example, replacing bark is an operating expense, not capital work, so you can’t use your 5YA funding to pay for it.

5 Year Agreement Funding

Property maintenance grant funding

The 10 Year Property Plan (10YPP) sets out work priorities for schools.

10 Year Property Plan

If you’re unsure who owns your existing playground, contact your property advisor.

Playgrounds built with chromated copper arsenate (CCA) treated timber

In the past, some playgrounds were built with timber preserved with CCA. This makes them a potential hazard because CCA contains arsenic.

We provide information about how to manage timber treated with CCA in schools.

Timber treated with chromated copper arsenate (CCA)

To insure your school playground, you must:

• take out your own insurance policy
• pay for it using board funding.

Our school building insurance funding programme doesn’t cover repairs for playgrounds if they’re damaged in an incident or unforeseen event.