Less than one year after asking residents to donate funds toward a replacement playground, La Jollan Mary Coakley and the Friends of La Jolla Shores\u2019 Kellogg Park are asking locals to help build Kellogg Park\u2019s new Junior Lifeguard-themed playground \u2014 purchased with residents\u2019 donations \u2014 during the Kellogg Park Playground Community Build, April 30 through May 2. One evening last May, La Jolla Shores locals spotted city workers dismantling the popular beachside park playground. “The city removed a major portion of playground equipment; they deemed that it was unsafe,” said Mary Coakley, co-creator of La Jolla Shores\u2019 MAP and La Jolla Shores restroom remodeling projects. City crews removed all but a set of swings from La Jolla Shores\u2019 Kellogg Park. The park\u2019s greenbelt sits a few feet from the Shores\u2019 sand and some of the Pacific\u2019s calmer waters, which residents say draw between 2 to 3 million locals and tourists yearly. So Coakley and other residents formed the Friends of La Jolla Shores website in an effort to raise funds to replace the playground equipment. Several locals spent weekends at Kellogg Park, gathering donations to fund the replacement playground. “Originally we were going to put in a cookie-cutter playground, but because we almost lost the Junior Lifeguard program, one thing led to another,” Coakley said. Coakley, along with co-chairs Greg Salmon and Tory Gulley, designed the mini lifeguard-station playground, which includes art panels expanding on the adjacent MAP project, ocean safety tips, junior lifeguard station art and a replica of J.J. the gray whale, which SeaWorld rescued in 1997, Coakley said. “We\u2019re focusing on safety. Our equipment has already been delivered \u2014 everything except the art panels,” Coakley said. Coakley said designing the complete playground took time, but it includes slides, bridges and most basic equipment, including one side for older children and another for younger kids. Then, Coakley and the chairs designed additional art in keeping with the junior lifeguard theme, such as a rescue buoy and play defibrillator inside the mini first-aid station, Coakley said. On the older kids side, a junior lifeguard station office holds a sign that says “sign ups” with the junior lifeguard website, according to Coakley. “Each panel will have artwork,” Coakley said. “There will be tips for safety in the ocean, there\u2019s how to do the \u2018Stingray Shuffle.\u2019 And we have a replica of J.J. the Gray whale that [will replace dolphin statues], and there will be an etching of J.J.\u2019s story around the sea wall.” Coakley said Friends of La Jolla Shores hope to complete installation of the playground before Memorial Day, but the clay replica of J.J. will replace the dolphins later, she said. “We all worked together to design [the playground],” Coakley said. Now, Coakley said the Kellogg Park Playground Community Build will allow locals to gather in an effort to build the playground. “The contractor will be responsible for digging about 60 holes,” Coakley said, adding that she hopes tool-bearing attendees will arrive. Coakley said teens are invited. “[La Jolla] Country Day\u2019s kids want to come and interact for the community build and we\u2019re working on figuring out food and stuff,” Coakley said. “The first day, holes will be dug and we\u2019ll unpack everything.” The group is asking locals to sign up for shifts at their website. For more information or to sign up for a shift, visit www.friendsoflajollashores.com or contact Coakley, mary@ friendsoflajollashores.com.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Less than one year after asking residents to donate funds toward a replacement playground, La Jollan Mary Coakley and the Friends of La Jolla Shores\u2019 Kellogg Park are asking locals to help build Kellogg Park\u2019s new Junior Lifeguard-themed playground \u2014 purchased with residents\u2019 donations \u2014 during the Kellogg Park Playground Community Build, April 30 through […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11560","_seopress_titles_title":"Shores calls for volunteers to build playground","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11560,11551,11593,11550],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-297874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-la-jolla-village-news","category-news","category-no-images","category-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297874","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=297874"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297874\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=297874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=297874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=297874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}