Unsafe park equipment raises calls about Modiin being anti-haredi

Modiin has had its share of up and downs in its relationship with its haredi neighbors of Modiin Ilit... Famously, Modiin tried to ban non-residents (i.e. haredi residents from nearby Modiin Ilit) from its beautiful park, Park Anabe, though that did not work out too well.

Leading up this Pesach, Modiin announced that the park equipment in Anabe would be closed to the public for safety reasons (as per the instructions of the Standards Institute)- some of the equipment had been damaged and was falling apart and had yet to be repaired.

Sure enough, some idiot has come up with a theory that "safety" was really just a ploy to keep haredim out of the park. By the end of Pesach vacation, the warning signs had been removed, prompting the theory that the entire time there were really no safety issues but was simply an attempt to keep haredim out of Modiin.
source: Kikar

The person quoted with this conspiracy theory asks if it was a safety issue, why couldn't the city fix it in time for the holiday vacation. Little does he know, that is not how cities work. They fix things a) when they get to it and b) when they have money for it. Not necessarily when it would make sense to fix. We have park equipment in Bet Shemesh for years that has been broken and remains unfixed, despite multiple vacations coming and going where it would have been nice to have those items fixed in time. Eventually the city gets to it.. or it does not.

Most surprising in this article is that it was written at all. If the fellow was an engineer or a safety expert and was making such a claim, that would be one thing. But he is not, or at least he is not quoted as being an engineer. This fellow is just an average person who probably knows nothing about equipment safety and had no opportunity to inspect the equipment. Yet he made his claim. And Kikar turned it into an article, validating his claim (to a certain extent).

Pointing it out on Facebook to friends in Modiin, it turns out the equipment was really unsafe, had been closed for a bit before Pesach, and already during Pesach it was reopened to the public and plenty of Haredim were there enjoying the equipment. As well, a number of other parks with wooden playground equipment were also shut down by the Standards Institute for being unsafe.

So, it seems this guy in Modiin Ilit had a bad day, picked the wrong day to go to the park, came up with a silly theory, and Kikar ran with it.

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