Tucked among the redwoods and pines of Roberts Regional Recreation Area, the $560,000 joint effort between Oakland Rotary Club No. 3 and the East Bay Regional Park District features swings and slides accessible by wheelchair. The new play area was dedicated Saturday.

Organizers, however, envision children of all ages, sizes and abilities using the playground.

"Part of the benefit," said Eddie Snow, chairman of the Rotary Club's playground committee, "is the immersion of disabled children with able-bodied children. Kids do real well together."

A new concrete path leads onto the play structure, creating an elevated level of accessibility.

"You can't get a wheelchair through sand," Snow said.

The 64-year-old hills resident launched the project after seeing a similar Rotary-sponsored playground in 1994 in Portland, Ore.

"It just touched my heart. I wanted to resolve that in the Bay Area," Snow said.

The play structure has three levels with platforms and walkways wide enough for wheelchairs to roll up to the 22 activity panels mounted throughout the structure.

From maps and mazes to chimes, and I-Spy as well as paper-scissors-rock games, the interactive panels are geared to inspire dialogue, said manufacturer Steve Lebwohl of Wildwood Playgrounds in Portland, Ore.

The red, blue and yellow panels, some equipped with rotating wheels and tactile play for blind children, quiz children on everything from states and shapes to animals and numbers.

The new swing set includes a red chair swing with head and leg supports.

Built in the meadow next to the park's wheelchair-accessible pool, the 12,000-square-foot play area replaces a wooden playground, said park supervisor Paul Miller.

The park district added more handicapped parking spaces and renovated the bathrooms to follow Americans with Disabilities Act standards, Miller said. Oakland Rotary Club volunteers bolted signs in Braille to the equipment.

Parents with disabilities previously could not access play areas, said Gerald Baptiste, deputy director for Berkeley's Center for Independent Living.

"Now, they can go right up there with their kids and watch them go down the slide," Baptiste said.

The Oakland hills project, though, is far from completion. About $500,000 is still needed to enhance the unique play area, said Jack Griffith, a Berkeley-based landscape architect who masterminded the design.

It will take a year to raise those funds, Snow said.

"I'm far more realistic than when I began." Snow said. "But once people see what's up there now, that will be a great motivator."

Further plans include adding a wheelchair-accessible sand area and a water table with audio aid stations for the visually impaired, Griffith said.

"Everybody's waited for so long," Griffith said. "We're finally getting to the point where kids are going to be able to use it -- and that's the best part."