I’m not sure how to properly word this, but it is a recurring point of frustration for me.
Public playgrounds are eligible. School playgrounds are not. However, in Danmark all playgrounds on Public schools ARE Public playgrounds. They are never fenced in, and people are encouraged to use them outside of school hours.
Families can go there, but children also often use the facilities alone.
I work at a school, and we have signs asking people to refrain from visiting during school hours, and to be courteous of the neighbours.
In some places, there are wayspots at school playgrounds, but obviously most nominations are rejected. I myself reject every time I see one.
But I think it’s silly.
Would it be possible to have an exception? Or could we potentially nominate, and then appeal a rejection based on the fact that they ARE public?
Or should we simply just continue to accept that they are not eligible.. Even though it seems a bit silly
I have added a couple of screenshots from some random pages i found in English, to backup my claim.
You will not get an exception. This is conceptually similar to people who want an except for little free libraries which are put adjacent to the pavement for people to use, but are physically located on single-family private residential property (SFPRP).
The rules around schools and SFPRP are clear - not eligible under any circumstances. This is correct, however frustrating it is here.
I was thinking this would be the case. But no harm in asking i guess
It’s just really frustrating, because it obviously IS a public playground. Most of all, I think it’s a cultural thing and the rules obviously stem from a different part of the would, so it just seems arbitrary to insist.
I will keep rejecting then.
It would be (extremely) hard to have localised rules that allow these playgrounds, without opening up similar grey areas elsewhere. Once things stop being black and white, the shades of grey go gradually from white to black and you have no defined cut-off point.
But I can’t see why the stops would have to be closed?
There’s plenty of stops and gyms which are only accessible to some people, some of the time. In mall and stores, or behind gates areas, in amusement parks or other places with restricted access. They don’t close outside of opening hours, they’re simply just not accessible
It’s just such an odd rule that public playgrounds are eligible and almost always approved, unless they are at schools. In my brain, it doesn’t make any sense at all.
You can’t have people hanging around inside schools playing mobile games when they have no other reason to be there. Nothing to do with playgrounds, everything to do with schools.
Edit: more accurately, Scopely Explore cannot be encouraging this.
The issue here isn’t accessibility, it’s that an active pokestop could be seen as encouraging people onto school property during operational hours. It would also potentially be a distraction for the children who are supposed to be learning.
It would most likely lead to the schools requesting a geo-block, which would result in the waypoints becoming permanently blocked for everyone.
In Denmark smaller children aren’t allowed to use their phones during the day. They are collected when school starts, and handed out at the end of the day.
In some schools the older students are allowed to have them during recess, but must then turn them back again. So that wouldn’t be an issue at all.
I know several schools which has had pokestop and or gyms at their playgrounds since the game was launched, and I have never heard about it being a problem at all. I don’t think the teachers are aware of this, unless they play themselves.
And all public schools are, in legal regards, open to the public. So everybody can walk in whenever they want to, as long as the doors are open, so during school hours. If you’re being weird about it, you will obviously be asked to leave. This is also why the schools are asking nicely that people refrain from using the are during school hours.
Besides, all stops/gyms would be easily accessible standing outside of school grounds. Many schools are located near other areas such as football fields, public swimming pools, basket courts and so on. They are often in the middle of a town, and the parking space is often used for other than just school related visits.
Ignoring the “On School Property” rules all wayspots should be accessible up to the actual POI. Remember that Wayspots are not just for Pokemon Go and other games may not have the 80m interaction radius.
This is an example of a school in my area. It is very intertwined with the neighbourhood. I’ve marked the school and so on.
Everything else is private residence.
I do understand. We have a similar issue in Scotland that a lot of school land is council land, and includes a sports complex for use by both the school and the public. Running track, caged football pitch and sometimes a lot more, being used by clubs, local businesses and all sorts.
It’s a mess, but the ‘no waypoints on school land’ rule trumps everything else.
Making exceptions would just cause too much work. Who would decide that “this is a public park that is sometimes used by the school” and “This is a park on school property”.
it is so much easier to state “On School Property = Reject”, this should include anything that is regularly used by the school whether owned by them or not.
Unfortunately times have changed, as kids we would often climb the fence in to the school grounds to take a shortcut or to play football on the top part of the field. As long as there was no complaints the caretaker left us alone.
The replacement of standard wooden fences with spiky high metal ones show that this would not be allowed today
