6/01/13 UPDATE: Estimates for Matsunami Mountain Playground Design are being finalized and numbers will be announced soon. Fundraising efforts will be starting shortly. We need your help to make this special playground!
5/25/13 UPDATE: Cincinnati couple, Steve and Helen Rindsberg, visited Ishinomaki and met with members of the Ishinomaki Urban Planning Department, the neighborhood leader, my cousin and her husband Emiko and Hiroshi Motoki, as well as members of our team and Fumi Asano from Yanmar Equipment Division.
5/22/13 UPDATE: U.C. DAAP Professor Peter Chamberlin visited Ishinomaki to see the Matsunami Park area and to meet with our team members including Junichi Shishido and Jinichi Murakami, members of the construction company, and the president of MIyagi Yanmar. He also met with the Deputy Mayor of Ishinomaki and the local Ishinomaki newspaper did a story on this project. http://www.hibishinbun.com/news/olive_diary.cgi?page=18
3/7/13 UPDATE: We have received word that those in Ishinomaki have chosen the Matsunami Mountain design to be built in Matsunami Park. We are now working with the city to find the construction company to give the cost estimate and build this design.
Matsunami Mountain Design:
http://www.i-playground.org/wp-content/gallery/MatsunamiMountain_FinalPresentation.pdf
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The five playground designs by the University of Cincinnati DAAP students were sent to the city of Ishinomaki. The city is allowing one of the designs to be built in a section of Matsunami Park in Ishinomaki. The city wanted those that live in the area around the Matsunami Park to decide on which design they would like to have built in their neighborhood. This has taken some time, since this area experienced tremendous loss of lives, including that of the former neighborhood leader. Only one-third of the former residents are living in the area and many have moved or are still living in temporary housing. The new neighborhood leaders have been working with us to help get this decision made.
We have received word that the neighborhood has chosen a design (we do not know which one yet) and we are waiting to hear the formal response from the city.
Once we know the design that is chosen, we will work on getting a more precise estimate of the cost to build the chosen playground design and will then have the specific target numbers for our fundraising efforts.
