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Community

All-Inclusive Playground Opens

Davenport Parks and Recreation
the accessible slide in Gabe's Play Village
Credit Davenport Parks and Recreation

After years of planning and fund-raising, a new playground has opened in Davenport's Vander Veer Park.

Chad Dyson, Parks and Recreation Director, says it's called Gabe's Play Village, and named for Gabe Cypret, a young man who uses a wheelchair. The playground is designed to be "all-inclusive."

"Essentially what it does is it allows for children with disabilities to access the majority if not all of the play features. For example, a child or an adult in a wheelchair can access the actual steps and utilize the slide." 

Credit Davenport Parks and Recreation
Gabe's Play Village in Vander Veer Park

The leader of effort to open the new playground is his grandmother, Gloria Cypret. She and some friends raised 600,000 dollars in donations and grants to build it. 

The playground also has a rubber surface for people with mobility difficulties.

Dyson says the old playground in Vander Veer Park was more than 20 years old and due to be replaced anyway.

A native of Detroit, Herb Trix began his radio career as a country-western disc jockey in Roswell, New Mexico (“KRSY, your superkicker in the Pecos Valley”), in 1978. After a stint at an oldies station in Topeka, Kansas (imagine getting paid to play “Louie Louie” and “Great Balls of Fire”), he wormed his way into news, first in Topeka, and then in Freeport Illinois.