Where I Go: The Playground That Helped Make Prague Feel Like Home

On the Plastic Benches of Výtoň’s Park, I Watched Our Sons Play and Let My Imagination Roam

In 2013, my wife and I rented an apartment in Výtoň, a classic urban neighborhood south of the tourist-packed city center of Prague. This wasn’t my first move to the capital of the Czech Republic. As a historian, I had been coming to Prague for short spells each summer for 10 years running. But, eager to explore, I always chose a different neighborhood to live in. My only fixed points were friends’ homes, a few locally admired pubs, and the archives that justified these trips to one of the world’s …

Why Kids Need Delightfully Dangerous Playgrounds

If Risk-Averse Parents Insist on Safer Slides and Swings, Their Children Won't Learn How to Overcome Fear

California doesn’t make playgrounds like it used to.

The trend has its advantages. Fifteen years after the state legislated compliance with national safety standards for new and renovated public playgrounds, I …