Many local skateboarders are interested in designing skate features at Chimborazo Playground. Andrew Cauthen, a local skateboarder, writes:
There are no places to go [skateboarding] in Richmond whatsoever…We had a place over at the old Azalea Mall. It was named “Hippoland” and became a safe haven for kids of all ages to have good clean fun where prostitution, drugs, and short-sighted capitalism once happened. Just some things that people brought or friends made out of concrete on an abandoned bowling alley foundation. It had been really nice for a few years and was developing nicely. Even though it was completely “illegal”, nobody bothered us. I think it should be illegal for property owners to sit on property for so long without sharing it with the community. We had contests, fundraisers, demos from skateboarders all across the country… We could help raise money and build everything [at Chimborazo Playground]. Nothing fancy. Just a place to go. Skateboarders, rollerbladers, scooters, etc could play on it too and everything would be fairly small, so regulations wouldn’t be needed… This would greatly improve the community …and set a easily attainable standard for other places.
Skateparks keep kids off the streets and give them safe places to practice their sport.
1. Skateboarding is a safe sport.
2. It’s safest when done in a facility built for skateboarding.
A skateboarding feature is in the Department of Parks, Recreation & Facilities’ master plan for Chimborazo Playground, though what features it will contain have yet to be decided. If you’re interested in providing input into the skateboarding area and/or helping raise funds, come out to next month’s meeting (Monday, Feb 8, 7pm at the East District Center).
http://www.skatepark.org/2009-skatepark-presentation.html
http://skateboarding.transworld.net/2008/07/30/maloof-money-cup-final-shesh-videos/
http://www.ci.kettering.oh.us/newweb/departments/recreation/rec_fac_skate.php
http://www.skateplaza.org/
http://www.durhamcentralpark.org/park-info/skate-park/
http://www.thedurhamnews.com/news/story/200007.html
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From a press release by the Tony Hawk Foundation:
press release here: http://tonyhawkfoundation.org/content/list/20100209/index.html
It is absurd that Richmond doesn’t have a skatepark. Yesterday at Chimborazo there were thirty to forty people skateboarding. The skateparks around Richmond, Polgreen in Mechanicsville and Laurel in Glen Allen are about twenty years old now and are terrible. The ramps at both parks are pretty much unskateable and to point out the obvious the aren’t in Richmond. I live in Oregon Hill, my neighborhood as well as the Fan are full of Skateboarders many who are VCU students. VCU police are cracking down on skateboarding, but there is simply no legal, as well as public place to skateboard, other than Chimborozo. If a skatepark is in the works for Chimborozo, that is great news. I don’t know if it is the best location (considering the large amount of skateboarders in the VCU area) but I, and many other skateboarders in town) will take it. I think a good example of a skatepark Richnmond should take a look at is the park in Durham, NC that opened recently, it is a great concrete skate park the kind of park Richmond deserves to have. I’m interested in doing anything I can to help Richmond obtain a great concrete skatepark and many thanks to the residents of Church Hill and the friends of Chimborozo Playground for giving us a place to skate.