Tom Vanderbilt goes after children’s play equipment or, as he calls it, "kiddie sprawl":
I have come to think of all these things, in both their lack of use and aesthetic alien-ness, as being symptomatic of the decline of the American lawn. I don’t mean grass per se but, rather, the whole relationship of the house to its exterior; the meaning of the outdoor space as a pastoral enclave in a larger natural setting; the civility and beauty brought by the carefully considered arrangement of plants, trees, and shrubs—the sort of things one used to see in the so-called "garden suburbs." […]
The unused plastic playthings and private playgrounds scattered in the barren yard speak not only to vanishing outdoor play but to a larger cultural disconnect from nature, from one’s own environment. But there is a simple solution for this. Instead of buying cheap, potentially toxic plastic water slides and the like, plant a garden. Plant a tree. Plant something. It may not impress your neighbor, but it will last longer, it will look better, and it will have a better effect on the environment than plastic slides.
Rachael Larimore counters the joy-kill:
While they might be unsightly, they are durable, safe (no splinters or jagged rusty metal), and affordable. We have a few that get hauled into the garage each night, but the main feature of our backyard is a sturdy wooden play set with swings, a slide, a rock-climbing wall and other accessories. When the weather is nice, and occasionally even when there’s a foot of snow on the ground, my two sons play on it probably two or three hours a day. That leaves many hours of the day when one could pass by and see it looking lonely and abandoned, but it is by far their favorite plaything. However much or little they use it, it was a worthwhile investment. It can accommodate the dozen or so kids who live on our street, or our passel of nephews, or even all of them at the same time. It provides exercise, helps develop agility and self-confidence, and even jolts the imagination, as the kids are always coming up with games whose rules and objectives escape me. One of the knocks on parents these days is that we either park the kids in front of the TV for six hours with a bag of chips, or we hover over them obsessively and overbook them with dance, gymnastics, karate, and swimming lessons. To me, having some toys in the yard to go climb on is a remedy to both of those ills.
The Dish 