Recently Remodeled Playground Cracking, Rusting

By Charles Talkoff

After spending an estimated $1.9 million to renovate Rochambeau Playground, the city still faces a need to repair the facility. Cracks have formed in the new asphalt and new play structures are beginning to rust.

The playground, located on 25th Avenue between California and Lake streets, reopened April 24, 2004 and cracks appeared in the new asphalt of the tennis courts on April 28.

Scot Burbank, a landscape architect with the SF Department of Public Works, (DPW) who worked on the original renovation, said that the problem may have resulted from "poor compacting," a process in which a new level consisting of 95 percent rock and sand, is layered below the new asphalt. That would have required the old asphalt to be removed.

Burbank stated that there were two problems at the playground.

"Abutting new asphalt against old asphalt can cause cracking," and the failure to remove the old asphalt "telescoped" pre-existing cracks, he said. When asked if the city was aware that there were already cracks in the asphalt, Burbank said, "They couldn't be missed; everyone who went to the playground saw them."

Two sources familiar with the renovation, who asked not to be identified, stated that the city knew before the renovation began that the new asphalt for the tennis courts was to be purely cosmetic, but went ahead with the work.

Sheryl Costa, a public affairs representative for DPW said there was a miscommunication in understanding the meaning of the word "resurfacing" in the contract.

"Resurfacing can mean different things to different people," she said. "The technical meaning is different from what a lay-person would understand. It's possible that's where the misunderstanding came from."

Kin Wo Construction was contracted to do the Rochambeau Playground renovation because it provided the lowest bid for the project. According to Costa, Kin Wo subcontracted the resurfacing. When asked the cost for the resurfacing, and the name of the subcontractor, Costa said that she did not have the name or figures, but that she had asked associates to find them. Neither the name of the subcontractor or the cost of the resurfacing were available as of presstime.

Jorge Alfaro, project manager for the playground renovation, declined to answer any questions regarding Rochambeau, saying only, "I know what this (call) is about. No comment."

Asked about abutting new asphalt against old, Burbank, who has 20 years experience in landscaping, said, "We (the City) do it all the time."

He added that it's only a problem if the process is not done properly.

"The asphalt is mixed at the batch plant and uses city specifications," Burbank said.

Unlike the tennis courts, which have cracks that stretch more than 100 feet across the facility, the area near the clubhouse is under warranty. A meeting has been scheduled to address the problems.

District 1 Supervisor Jake McGoldrick is expected to attend the meeting.

McGoldrick, responding to the neighborhood group, Friends of Rochambeau Playground, was one of the principal advocates for elevating Rochambeau further up the SF Recreation and Park Department's Capital Improvement Plan's list of projects. 

Pete Lavaroni, who heads the Kittredge School, a neighbor of Rochambeau, said the process of getting the City to work on renovating the facility began more than five years ago.

"Maria Morgan-Butcher really got the word out to the community. Friends of Rochambeau put pressure on the City to spend the money," he said.

Morgan-Butcher heads the Friends group and frequently attended city meetings to urge the renovation.

"This was a classic example of a grass-roots effort," she said.

Within one week of the park reopening, cracks began to appear, according to an anonymous source.

"I griped; I moaned, I complained, and nothing happened. It makes me sad and angry; soon enough the courts won't be useable and the trash cans and play structures are rusting. We'll have to start all over again."

When asked why the City went ahead with the project and put one layer of asphalt over the other, instead of taking out the old and starting with a new base, Burbank said, "There was no budget for it, so it didn't get done."

Asked to speculate on the problem further, he said, "It could be that the bottom layer is sand, but to find out, the city would have to pay a geo-tech to dig down and do a study. But there was no budget for that either."

Judy Mosqueda, a project manager with Rec. and Park, sees the Rochambeau renovation as a general success while admitting there are problems that need to be fixed.

"Anyone who knows tennis courts knows cracking is going to happen sooner or later. Rec. and Park deals with the worst of their courts on an annual basis."

The cracks, however, appeared within a few days of the completion of the renovation and have spread well beyond the area of the tennis courts. Currently, they reach nearly across the entire area of the playground where the new asphalt was applied.

Asked about what's being done to address the problem, Mosqueda said the contractor, Kin Wo has been contacted and is expected to provide the City with a report on the conditions at the facility. Repeated calls to Kin Wo for comment were unanswered.

"We know we need to address it," Mosqueda said.

"We have a meeting scheduled with Supervisor McGoldrick and Morgan-Butcher; we're investigating what the problems are, what the solutions will be, and we'll work with the community to move forward," Mosqueda said. She could not give a cost estimate for the repairs as of presstime.

"Employees have to pay out of their own pocket to buy food for the kids who come to the playground," said one source familiar with the situation. "The City helps out a little with that but now, they want to start charging for activities for the little kids. The playground has 18 lines for the Internet and no money for computers or an actual Internet hook-up. If the neighborhood kids have a place to go, it means they're not getting into trouble - they're not doing drugs or breaking into your car. It's a sad, frustrating situation."

Underscoring that point, Rochambeau was vandalized at the end of March. In response, Rec. and Park ordered the playground closed for the weekend.

"The kids will be busy going somewhere else and the park will go back to where it was, to what it used to be and then the City will have to start all over again. They just rushed the whole renovation and they didn't need to," the source said.