July 2018 - Parks & Recreation - 75

Member Spotlight: Max Madalinski
By Vitisia Paynich

ax Madalinski didn't anticipate a career in parks and recreation. After earning his
master's degree in ecological design in 2016, from The Conway School of Landscape Design in Conway, Massachusetts, Madalinski only knew that he wanted
to work in a planning and design environment. However, an opening for an associate parks
project coordinator for City of Burlington Parks, Recreation & Waterfront in Vermont, eventually, led him to the field. Now more than a year-and-half later at the agency, Madalinski is
still enjoying the best of both worlds: planning and designing projects and working outdoors.
Parks & Recreation magazine recently caught up with Madalinski
to discuss the most challenging
part of his job, why playgrounds
are vital to communities and what
he deems the best part of being in
the parks and recreation field.

Parks & Recreation: What's the
most challenging part about your
job?
Max Madalinski: There are a lot of different projects taking place within our
department that I manage, as well as
projects that my teammates have to
manage. On top of that, right now in
the city, there are all these other construction projects being built that influence what we're doing. The biggest
challenge is time management and
ensuring that everything that needs
to get done is getting done. As an example, we've got some environmental
projects going on as a result of soil
contaminants. In Burlington, we have
a big waterfront where there used to
be a lot of petroleum-based businesses. The city has slowly taken control
of these sites and converted them into
parks. But any time we want to work
on a new project along the waterfront,
it means that we're going to encounter
soil with a history of contamination.
It requires a lot of dotting the i's and
crossing the t's on these projects to
make sure that we won't get in trouble

with the state or the EPA for managing
these hazardous materials incorrectly.
P&R: Why are playgrounds so
important to communities?
Madalinski: I have a 3-year-old son
and we spend so much time at the
playground; it's one of his favorite
things to do. Playgrounds give kids
the opportunity to be independent,
have fun, really get them outside
and moving their bodies. We are
just starting to renovate a number
of our playgrounds now, and we
have some really exciting concepts
that we're working on, along with
some new equipment that's compelling and interesting.
P&R: How do you see playgrounds
changing in the future?
Madalinski: A project that we're
working on right now is a universally accessible playground, in which
everything in it is designed for children of all abilities. I think that's
been a general trend in playground
design over the past decade or so.
On another note, it's obvious that
park agencies must ensure that their
equipment is not going to break
down, fall apart or cause unnecessary lawsuits as a result of kids getting hurt, but we also need to balance [safety and] maintenance with
keeping the equipment exciting and

making sure that there's a [captivating] reason for kids to get on that
equipment. Playgrounds need to be
more interactive and allow kids to
have some independence. Doing research on playgrounds, I've found
myself very compelled by the adventure playground concept. While
there are very few in the U.S., adventure playgrounds have been around
for a while - but they have gone out
of style over the past three decades
in the U.S. due to liability reasons.
They are really popular in Europe,
and I think it's an interesting idea
that I personally would like to see
more of here in the United States.
P&R: What do you appreciate
most about working in parks and
recreation?
Madalinski: I love that, as part of
my job, I get to interact frequently
with the outdoors. Even though I'm
mostly a desk-based person at my
job, I still get to be outside and go
on site visits. On any given day, my
job can involve going on a lakefront
bike ride just to get from one site to
the other to examine construction
projects that are going on. That's
definitely one of the biggest perks
of being in parks and recreation.
- Vitisia Paynich, Freelance Writer for Parks & Recreation magazine

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