Veterans Park is now a play haven for kids and adults

Volunteers assemble Hamtramck’s newest playscape in Veterans Park. The playscape covers a 9,000 square-foot area.

By Charles Sercombe
By the end of this week, Hamtramck kids will have a brand new place to play.
This will be no ordinary play area.
It’s a fancy playscape that covers a 9,000 square foot section in the rear of Veterans Park. This playscape now bookends with another playscape that is in the front portion of the park.
Yes, it will take a little hike to get there, but it will be well worth it. This is a state-of-the-art play space that features various equipment chosen by Hamtramck school kids.
On top of all that, it cost the city nothing. The playscape comes from a $600,000 grant, and it was coordinated by a private company with the playful name of Kaboom.
On Tuesday, a group of volunteers gathered and began unpacking and assembling the playscape gear.
Just like putting together an IKEA piece of furniture, it’s not necessarily something you want to see, as volunteers painstakingly tried to make sense of how to assemble the gear. Add 80-plus degree burning temperatures to that chore, and, well, this group of volunteers deserves a lot praise for keeping their cool.
Just for the record, there was no cursing heard, at least by early afternoon.
This project is the latest in a number of other improvements coming to the park.
Recently, the city received a federal grant, worth almost $654,000, to install restrooms at Veterans Park.
It gets better.
There is an additional $300,000 coming from the state to add to installing restrooms at the historic Hamtramck baseball stadium.
The state grant will also go toward installing a drinking fountain; making improvements to the stadium’s utility infrastructure; and repaving a pathway from the park’s restroom to the stadium’s parking lot.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony will be held for the playscape this Friday, July 28, at 2:30 p.m.
Kids and adults are invited to attend, and then, well, play.
Posted July 28, 2023