ATHENS, Ohio — Strouds Run State Park is becoming more accessible to visitors with disabilities.
On Sept. 18, the Ohio Department of Natural Resources announced plans to build a mobility inclusive playground and an Americans with Disabilities Act compliant bathroom over the coming year.
Not long after, the Athens City-County Health Department’s Creating Healthy Communities program announced that their mobility accessibility project, which aims to install an accessibility ramp and accessible canoe/kayak launch, was fully funded and construction would soon start.
“It certainly is great timing,” ODNR Parks and Watercraft District Manager Michael Jarvis said. “We are committed to ensuring our parks are accessible to everyone.”
Ohio Department of Natural Resources upgrades
The upgrades to Strouds Run State Park are part of a wider effort by ODNR to make state parks more accessible. Jarvis said that bathrooms at 11 other state parks are being renovated to meet ADA standards and that more inclusive playgrounds are on the way.
“We have [put in accessible playgrounds] at a number of parks,” Jarvis said. “Dillon State Park is an example of one that we’ve put in. We’ve identified a number of parks that would benefit from an inclusive playground like this.”
Jarvis said that the park is going to be as modern as possible, specifically noting the use of a rubberized mat instead of gravel or mulch for the playground’s surface. The rubber matting was chosen to accommodate visitors with pica, a condition which causes the compulsive swallowing of non-food items.
“It’ll be a rubber matting,” Jarvis said. “This one is a little unique compared to the ones we’ve done before because of that sand in close proximity,” Jarvis said. “It’ll be a rubberized matting covered in an outdoor carpet-like material.”
The funding for the playground project came from an anonymous donation to the Ohio State Parks Foundation. Lisa Daris, the executive director of the Ohio State Parks Foundation, said that the donor and the foundation shared a similar financial philosophy.
“Our mission is to support the parks by making them welcoming to more people,” Daris said. “That’s a pretty broad mission. We’ve found that a lot of our projects that really resonate with the public are ones that focus on making our parks more accessible to those with mobility or disability issues.”
The playground equipment is designed to accommodate all forms of disabilities, both visible and invisible.
“There’s things like an expression swing with adaptive seating to help those with upper body mobility issues,” Daris said. “There will also be harmonic chimes, which is good for people who relate to their environment via their auditory senses.”
Construction has already begun on the playground project and Jarvis expects it to be completed by this winter, weather permitting.
Those involved in the project hope that local families and schools will take advantage of the new infrastructure to get out in nature. Arian Smedley, the assistant superintendent for the Athens County Board of Developmental Disabilities and the Beacon School, said that the importance of an inclusive playground goes beyond just getting outdoors.
“Play is the work of childhood,” Smedley said. “Children need to be able to play safely in a way that allows them to participate and engage with their peers.”
Davey McNelly, an Athens resident with a disability and the executive director for Southeast Ohio Center for Independent Living, is excited to see the changes being made to Strouds. McNelly, who is part of the Creating Healthy Communities’ accessible beach project, said he was shocked when the ODNR announcement was publicized.
“[The restroom] is huge,” McNelly said. “Otherwise how do you get changed? How do you use the restroom if you have a disability? This is a huge bonus for bringing in more people and meeting accessibility needs.”
Meredith Erlewine, who coordinates the Creating Healthy Communities program for the Athens City-County Health Department, led the fundraising effort and was thrilled to hear that ODNR was paying for the bathroom upgrades out of pocket.
“We were advocating for [the ADA-compliant bathroom] but we weren’t picturing fundraising for it,” Erlewine said. “It’s not an easy project to fundraise for, a bathroom isn’t a sexy project like beach access or a kayak launch.”
The Creating Healthy Communities beach project
The Friends of Strouds Run supports the park by maintaining trails, building new trails and making the park more accessible.
The group previously built the Blackhaw Accessible Trail, the only mobility-inclusive trail at the park. Smedley said that the Blackhaw Accessible Trail has been a boon for the local disability community.
“Actually we had an event [at Blackhaw trail] last month,” Smedley said. “We had our teen time out there. We went on a hike together.”
Erlewine, who was part of the effort to build the Blackhaw Trail, said that working on the trail with the Friends of Strouds Run motivated her to get involved in the accessible beach project.
“I’ve already had an interest in making Strouds Run more accessible after working on [Blackhaw Trail],” Erlewine said. “Once you see how inaccessible things are you can’t close your eyes to it.”
The beach accessibility project involves installing a ramp from the parking lot to the beach and adding an accessible canoe/kayak launch. It began three years ago when Salem Miller, a local mother of a child with a disability, made a Facebook post about the lack of accessibility at the Strouds Run beach.
“A couple of summers ago I noticed a conversation on a Facebook group where a local mom was sharing her frustrations about Strouds Run’s beach,” Erlewine said. “Some of her kids could go down and play down on the beach while some of them couldn’t due to mobility disabilities that they have.”
As part of the Athens City-County Health Department’s Creating Healthy Communities program Erlewine, McNelly and Miller formed a steering committee with representatives of Friends of Strouds Run, ODNR and the United Seniors of Athens County. The group worked with Toole Design, an engineering firm, to create an initial design and a cost estimate.
“Over the past two years we’ve been steadily raising money, applying for grants,” McNelly said.
The group recently reached its fundraising goal after receiving a $99,000 Appalachian Development Grant from the Governor’s Office of Appalachia. An additional $30,000 was raised locally with support from the Athens County Foundation, the O’Bleness Foundation, the ATCO Legacy Fund, the Rocky Community Improvement fund, DuPont Polymer Products, the Athens Rotary Foundation, G&J Pepsi, Southeast Beverage Company, Lulu’s Casa El Camino Mexican Restaurant and individual donors.
“If our local contributors hadn’t given us the $30,000 we wouldn’t have been able to get the $99,000 from the grant,” Erlewine said.
The group expects the beach accessibility project and the accessible canoe/kayak launch to be completed in the summer 2025. The project has budgeted $84,000 for the accessible beach and $45,000 for the accessible canoe/kayak launch.
A common sentiment among those involved in the project is that Strouds Run State Park could become a regional tourist attraction for people with disabilities.
“This could be a destination spot for people with disabilities,” McNelly said. “You could walk on the accessible trail, there’s an accessible fishing dock, there’s an accessible beach, kayak launch and playground.”
This story was amended on Oct. 10 as it misidentified the Creating Healthy Communities accessible beach project as being the Friends of Strouds Run accessible beach project.
