For years, Kelly Davis looked across from where she lives on Bell Street at a vacant lot. She lives in an apartment complex right by the site and says there are plenty of kids in the surrounding neighborhood who could use a more accessible space.
“We have a park down the street, and we have a park down on Howe. But yeah, across the street is amazing because that’s been sitting there just vacant with nothing going on.”
The new playground will open at the end of this month on Bell Street near Sacramento’s Arden-Arcade neighborhood. It is designed so kids using mobility devices and other mobility devices can reach places they may not be able to at a typical park.
At the park’s largest play structure, a long accessible ramp will wind all the way up to the top, allowing children using wheelchairs to reach the upper decks of the jungle gym. Davis said she had not realized the park would allow children with a disability to share a playground experience with non-disabled children.
“I didn’t know anything about the wheelchair accessibility, but that’s really great for all the children who do have a disability out there,” Davis said.
An accessible seesaw at the soon-to-come emPOWERment park on Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.Tony Rodriguez/CapRadio
Mike Grace is the executive director of the Sacramento Parks Foundation. He said the tall wheelchair ramp was one of the main experiences organizers wanted the park to offer.
“Children in wheelchairs rarely get to experience the height factors in parks and in this park, they’ll be able to wheel up to the top and look out like all other children do,” Grace said. “We have swings that you can actually put a wheelchair on.”
The park is loaded with features that are aimed at keeping people of all abilities in mind.
The park has swings that can accommodate a wheelchair alongside a traditional seat, an accessible merry-go-round, and a soft, colorful rubber play surface. There are also sensory panels with sounds, slides and exercise equipment around the perimeter for parents or supervising adults to use.
The site is near schools Greer Elementary and Encina High School. Park officials said they hope the new playground will also take some pressure off nearby Swanson Park, which can become packed on weekends.
The Sacramento Parks Foundation and the Mission Oaks Recreation and Park District have been behind developing it. At the end of construction, the parks and recreation district will take ownership and operate it. Park officials said they began looking into the site around 2017 because Mission Oaks has little undeveloped land available for new parks.
The playground is built around an energy theme, since SMUD donated the vacant property it owned for the park to be built. Head of construction Kyle Goin said children will be able to interact with features that produce light effects and sounds.
“One of the really cool things for me is all of the electrical features that are in the play features themselves that the kids can go up to charge them themselves and turn on and hear sounds or see lights illuminate,” Goin said.
Two towers on the larger structure also have fans children can control, creating a kaleidoscope-like display of color. Goin said the large structure itself is custom-made and unlike anything he has worked on before.
“This is my very first one. And one of the cool features about this is this is the only play structure like this in the United States,” Goin said. “It’s a one-of-one.”
Daniel Barton with Mission Oaks Recreation and Park District said the broader goal is for children with different abilities to use the same playground together.
“This is the first park designed for the entire park to be for children of all abilities,” Barton said. “So able-bodied children and children with [wheelchair accessible] needs can come together to play. And that’s the whole idea of it: bringing the community together.”
Accessible swings at emPOWERment Park in Sacramento’s Arden-Arcade neighborhood on Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.Tony Rodriguez/CapRadio
The community also had a say in what went into the park. Organizers held several neighborhood events and visited nearby schools to ask children what they wanted to see.
“We actually went out to Greer School, which is down the street, and met at lunchtime all the kids over there,” Barton said. “There’s a lot of input [involved] from the community.”
The nearly $10 million park was funded with state grants, local park district money, and federal pandemic relief dollars from Sacramento County. Crews are now finishing the rubber surfacing, the landscaping and other final details ahead of the Aug. 29 opening.
Follow us for more stories like this
CapRadio provides a trusted source of news because of you. As a nonprofit organization, donations from people like you sustain the journalism that allows us to discover stories that are important to our audience. If you believe in what we do and support our mission, please donate today.