Place Narrative: The Belle Isle Playscape Detroit, MI

When I was younger I spent every weekend I could at my grandparent’s house in Detroit. I had fun getting away and playing with the neighborhood kids. I especially loved visiting with my cousins and doing things that I couldn’t do back at home in Saginaw. I remember when my grandfather used to take my cousins and me to Belle Isle Park in downtown Detroit. Belle Isle was like an entirely different planet; right on the edge of downtown Detroit there was (still is) this huge park surrounded by water. Back in the day there was a casino, a yacht club, a nature walk and zoo, super slide pavilions where people had family reunions and picnics even a museum on the island. All of those things were wonderful but I was really interested in the giant wooden playscape.
On the way to Belle Isle my grandfather would stop at a liquor store and give my cousin and I two dollars each to get some snacks and candy; he’d grab a tall can of Miller High Life. Everything was fantastic on those rides to Belle Isle. The sun would shine through the windows of my Grandaddy’s old Mercury Dynasty. We would ride down Woodward and then onto Jefferson Ave., passing through the shadows of skyscrapers that were full of business people back then. The sounds of smooth jazz v98.7 drifting from the radio, I was usually devouring a watermelon Big Slice lollipop and my cousin munching on Better Made chips; we’d share a bottle of peach Faygo. My grandfather would pull into the diagonal parking spots across in front of the playscape and say, “Alright, go have fun but when the sun starts to go down come and find me.” Then he’d walk down to one of the fishing docks and set up a lawn chair and sip his beer while looking across the Detroit River at Canada.
The playscape was like a wooden paradise for kids; there were all sorts of bridges, tunnels, places to hide and things to climb. It was the early 90’s and kids could play in peace without worrying about people shooting up the play ground or starting too much trouble. That playscape was anything we wanted it to be back then. Most times, we imagined that it was a castle and there was some foreign country trying to take over our kingdom. We ran full speed for hours, laughing and giggling, enjoying the sun on our bare brown arms and kicking up dirt and sand.
A few years ago, someone decided to tear down the wooden playscape and replace it with one of those cookie cutter plastic/rubber red, green, yellow, and blue things. None of the things that made Belle Isle a fun and family friendly place to be are still there. The Super slide stands in an abandoned corner of the park looking like a rusted dinosaur. The new plastic jungle gym is spray painted and unsightly. Kids still play here, but their parents watch them closely and never let them run too far. Belle Isle isn’t a safe place anymore. The police patrol it heavily on the weekends, especially when it is sunny outside. You don’t see families there anymore. No grandfathers on the fishing docks. People come to Belle Isle to ride in circles around the island showing off their cars, playing loud music and hanging out the windows. Over-sexed teens parade themselves around, drinking and smoking.
People have changed the wooden playscape that made such unique and interesting memories for lots of kids in Detroit into a manufactured playground. Empty or broken liquor bottles and torn condom rappers are mixed in with the dirty sand that I once sat and played in. There are stories on the news about young girls getting raped and fights breaking out on the basketball court the end up in shoot outs. I’ll admit I’ve been one of those over-sexed teens riding around blasting the latest rap song, drinking and laughing with my friends riding around Belle Isle like it doesn’t have any history. I miss the days where I could walk around with colorful barrettes in my hair and pretend I wasn’t right outside of downtown Detroit.