Belle Plaine removes iron horse swings over injury fears

Kids in the east-central Iowa town of Belle Plaine won’t have metal horse swings at the city park anymore. A national playground safety group says kids who walk in front of others as they’re swinging could get conked on the head and be badly hurt or killed. Belle Plaine’s Parks and Rec director Bill Daily says all three sets of the swings are being removed, but due to town budget constraints, they won’t be replaced. Daily says someone donated one-thousand dollars for new swings, but he says that won’t go far. While Daily says he has apprehensions about the safety of the swings since he’s a father, he hates to leave kids without that equipment at the park. He says the town is following the recommendations and tearing them down. He says there are likely hundreds of parks across Iowa that still have the metal horse swings. Daily says if society weren’t so “sue happy,” the durable metal horse swings he played on as a boy would still be there for today’s generation of kids. The Consumer Product Safety Commission blames the swings for two deaths and 42 serious injuries nationwide in the past 20 years.