Parkastic - Summer outdoor play project

Parktastic is a free, open-access outdoor play programme that brought organised play sessions to parks across Manchester, United Kingdom during the summer school holidays of 2025. Grounded in children's own expressed needs and directly responsive to what young people said during Manchester's Child Friendly City discovery phase, Parktastic is an example of a city turning listening into action at scale.

Manchester is working toward Child Friendly City recognition and has embedded children's voices throughout its journey. During the discovery phase, children and young people consistently said the same thing: they wanted more opportunities to play outdoors with their friends, and to feel safe while doing so. Public parks were identified as underused spaces for play particularly in the evenings, when many families, especially those from global majority communities, reported feeling less safe accessing them.

In summer 2025, Manchester commissioned 18 community organisations to deliver play sessions in 54 parks, achieving equal geographic coverage across every ward of the city. Each park hosted a minimum of one session per week for six weeks, with many wards receiving two. Sessions ran at 'teatime' intentionally scheduled for when other services close and when the need for safe, welcoming public spaces is greatest. The programme was open-access, free of charge, and aimed primarily at children aged 8 and over, with younger children welcome when accompanied by a parent or carer. In total, Parktastic recorded 6,480 attendances, averaging 20 children per session.

The programme was also conceived as a test: a structured opportunity to gather evidence about what works, what barriers remain, and what a longer-term investment in park-based play provision could look like for Manchester. Feedback was collected from children, young people, parents and carers throughout.

The results made a strong case. Parks when activated with organised, free, safe play opportunities become welcoming spaces for children who might otherwise have nowhere to go during long summer holidays. The model proved particularly valuable for children in communities where private outdoor space is limited and where access to paid leisure activities is constrained.

Building on this success, Manchester is expanding Parktastic in summer 2026, and is simultaneously developing a Play Sufficiency assessment - a systematic analysis of children's perceptions of play, the barriers they face, and what the city can do as a partnership to address them. The goal is a city where every child, in every neighbourhood, has the space, safety and opportunity to play.

To learn more: https://www.visitmanchester.com/event/parktastic/102545101/