It looks like someone forgot to eat breakfast before sitting down in front of Rhino.  At least throw in one of those SeaSk8 bacon strips guys!

Grindline took all of the feedback they gathered from the last meeting, and came up with these delicious new renderings.  Our folks at Parks tell us that these have been vetted through the initial layer of review with the Parks internal design folks, and may only need minor revisions.  Possible problems include the cantilevered slabs (safety), and some minor grading issues.

Features/changes of note include:

• the deathbox/gap theme
• the removal of the cool mini-ramp feature to the West of the bowl section
• the bowl being split into two
• the missing brick-stamped transition wall around the tree
• the apparent solution to the “which way to bend the kidney” problem
• the return of the Bainbridge shallow end (minus the pool block)

The SPAC meeting this Monday will serve as a de-facto feedback session on this new iteration of the design. Feel free to show up to the meeting and provide your input directly, or post it here in the comments section and I will deliver it for you.

The park will be smaller than originally planned, but this is still amazing news:

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Hello River City partners – We hope all is well for you all.
CONSTRUCTION OF THE SKATEPARK:
We have the permits in hand and will run through a design revision this week to coordinate the construction budget with the money we have in the bank.  We have to scale the park back a bit from what we had originally envisioned, but we feel that it is really of great benefit to the community.  The park will be more of a street park, with concrete benches, level changes, humps, and features that skaters of all ages can use.  Since it is a Grindline park, there will be many ways that one can use it.  When it is very busy, many users will be able to skate at one time. They have revised the design to a “pin wheel” that essentially allows five different sets of groups to skate at once, but it also acts as a continuous snake run that will allow folks at less popular times to connect obstacles all across the park. There will be a small kidney pool (envision a small swimming pool) with open sides that allow visible access and flow into that part of the park.

What this revised vision equates to is a park that is useful to more than just skateboarders. It will be a place to sit and watch that will be accessible to everyone.

Construction will start next week.  Mark Hubbard, James, Matt, and other Grindline folks will be onsite working for the next few months. Please let people know that they can stop and say hi, share tacos, drop off burritos, or say thanks any time.  Don’t hesitate to thank Sea Mar for the land.

We will follow up with a new graphic shortly – we are in triage mode to get the site mobilized and our revisions into the city for a seamless project beginning, but as soon as we have a pretty graphic I will get it out to you (and to the SP library and Neighborhood and Community  Centers).

More soon.
-mark and kim
River City Skatepark

West Seattle Skaters: get ready for another wild ride…

After much consideration and a few site visits, Seattle Parks has decided to proceed with a design process for a skatepark at Delridge Playfield.

Last week, Skatepark Advisory Committee Chair Ryan Barth and I met Seattle Parks Staff at High Point playfield to discuss a skatepark at that site, following up on the feedback from neighbors at the Myrtle meetings who wanted the skatepark built there instead of in their neighborhood. Kevin Stoops showed me what I already knew would be the only spot we could put the park, which is not big enough for the $725K park that they want to build in West Seattle. The entire site is already packed pretty tight with heavily programmed sports fields, with the exception of the treed area in the SW corner. Skaters love trees too, and we don’t want to tear them out, so we were basically looking at the small space between the trees and the pathway. By my estimation, this space is barely big enough for a 2500 sq/ft skate spot. Nestling the skate spot into that hillside, because the grade is so steep (look at the tennis courts…) they would have to build a retaining wall around it which would block sight lines and be expensive to build.

In essence: the site is a bad choice for a skatepark. I am disappointed that it even made it into the Skatepark Plan.

So then the question was: which site on the CityWide Skatepark Plan would be able to accommodate West Seattle’s first proper skatepark?

The only site in the citywide skatepark plan I thought would work based on existing uses and available space is Delridge playfield, so we drove over there and checked it out. There’s plenty of room to set it back from the street and give the folks in the homes across the street a little buffer zone. There’s a community center, and a big open area that is not currently programmed. There is also a teen program at the community center whose director is very excited about the idea of a skatepark to program. The downsides are that the neighbors across the street will be upset, but that’s always the case. Also, there aren’t as many families living right around the site, and there aren’t as many bus lines running by Delridge. But because this was the only site in all of West Seattle that had a large un-programmed space in it, I recommended that Parks consider Delridge for the $725K skatepark, and put High Point on a list for a future skate dot or small skate spot.

They took the recommendation back to Superintendent Gallagher and it was approved by the executive staff. So, Seattle Parks is moving forward with the design process for the Delridge location, and will be pursuing funding for the construction during the next budget cycle. Finding a design consultant could take a month, at which point a series of public meetings will be scheduled to gather input. If everything goes as planned, West Seattle skateboarders could be skating in a new park by the end of 2009, but the key step that has yet to happen is finding the actual construction dollars to build the park.

Keep checking back for meeting dates and future opportunities for supporting this new West Seattle skatepark.

Wednesday, Feb. 20, 2008 from 6:30 – 8:30 p.m @ Northgate Community Center:

Northgate Urban Center Park Redevelopment –

Parks Dept says: “At this meeting, the community can participate in creating a vision for the transformation of the 3.73 acres of mostly asphalt property to a new green urban park. Now a King County Park and Ride facility, the future park is located at the intersection of 5th Avenue NE and NE 112th Street.”

SSdotO: This project has been in the works for a long time. There is a Project Advisory Team already assembled, and it has a skateboarder representative on it. The downside is that the Northgate meetings for the City-wide skatepark plan were the most contentious, with people like Kris Fuller walking around writing “Skateboarders take and deal drugs” on the comment boards.

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Monday, Feb. 25, 2008 from 7:00 – 9:00 p.m @ Park Board Room, Denny Park, 100 Dexter Ave N:

Pro Parks Levy Oversight Committee -

Parks Dept says: “As part of his 2008 proposed budget, Mayor Greg Nickels will infuse Seattle neighborhoods with a one-time $7 million “Orphaned Parks Wish Fund.” If adopted by the City Council, this would be one of the largest funds of its kind in the city’s history. Every neighborhood will be eligible for funding to improve its parks.”

SSdotO: We reported on the announcement of this fund back in October, and it’s pretty huge. Sure, we’ve got a citywide skatepark plan, but there is no funding for any of it. We can’t skate a plan. It’s important that the Pro Parks Levy Oversight Committee hears about how they totally screwed up when they passed a 198.2 million dollar levy with absolutely zero-point-zero dollars earmarked for skateparks. It’s time to correct that oversight and make it right by directing some of this orphaned park money to skatepark development.

For skaters in Seattle, last year kinda sucked.

It started off crappy. I remember January 3rd, 2007 like it was yesterday. I was sitting at my desk at work, and someone from the Stranger called to ask me how I felt about the demolition of SeaSk8. I had spent the previous 4 years on the SPAC, going to countless meetings, but for some reason no one at Seattle Center felt like notifying any of us about the scheduled bulldozing of a beloved Seattle skatepark.

As 2007 rolled on, the Seattle Center staff, who report to Mayor Nickels, continued to play a shell game with the new location for SeaSk8. Corporate tenants the Experience Music Project, Pacific Science Center, and the Space Needle, fought successfully to keep the new skatepark out of the best location on Broad Street. David Della’s Parks committee then chose a new site on top of a beloved piece of art work. Finally, the City Council, tired and bewildered after years of squabbling over what should’ve been a no-brainer, forced the park into it’s current 2nd and Thomas ‘Pavilion’ site to the tune of 4+ Million dollars and the demolition of an actively-used building.

But things were looking up around August when Kris Fuller gave up on her costly litigation against the Lower Woodland skatepark. However it was not good news when it was said and done. She succeeded in stalling the park’s construction for over a year, and sapped over $20K out of park’s budget in delay and cost increases.

In West Seattle, a few angry neighbors managed to intimidate the Parks Department into pulling skateparks off of two improvement projects. At Ercolini Park, the organizers of the project didn’t even understand why Parks had removed the skate dot from the plans, because “one person had some concerns about noise but that was about it”. At Myrtle Reservoir, 20 neighbors showed up and voiced concerns about crime, degenerate skaters, and a general decline of peace and civility that the skatepark would bring. Further investigation into the emails sent to the Seattle Parks Department told a different story, where neighbors were simply afraid of the kids in the lower income High Point neighborhood coming to play near their houses.

More great news washed over the group that’s been successfully heading up the River City Skatepark project in South Park. They were awarded the remainder of the money they needed through a Department of Neighborhoods grant. This signaled the end of a very positive and successful process in which a community will be building a skatepark that has been entirely funded and driven by citizen effort, totally outside of the Parks Department process.

The city-wide skatepark plan was adopted, ushering in 27 pre-vetted sites as a result of an exhaustive 9-month public process.

Marginal Way poured a huge slab of flat and some more transition, cementing their place as a monument to Seattle skateboarder tenacity, dedication, and incredible sense of community.

2008 may very well be a pivotal year in Seattle’s skatepark history. Lower Woodland will be completed in a few months, and SeaSk8 construction will begin. River City will also be completed, and there are currently efforts in City Council to get funding for skateparks in Judkins, Jefferson, Delridge, and Roxhill. A skatedot fund is also being discussed.

It’s wise not to get your hopes up, as we’ve learned after repeated stalls and bumps along the road to getting more skateparks built in Seattle. But an optimistic eye would see at least a few great opportunities to turn this train around and get Seattle back on the track to becoming a great city for young and old skateboarders alike in 2008.

I’m not exactly sure how we missed this, but the Mayor just found $7M in the General Fund and he’s looking at you skateboarder.

Because they were largely following the skatepark-free Seattle Parks Development Plan of 2000, the original Pro Parks Committee glanced over the need for skateparks when they were tasked with allocating the funds. When the voters passed the Levy in 2000, they approved $198.2 million dollars for park improvement, acquisition, restoration, and development. Remarkably, none of that money was set aside for skatepark development.

(Note: The 2006 plan that replaces the 2000 directive also says nothing about skateparks.)

On September 19th, we reported that the Mayor’s budget proposal contains a line item for skateparks, for the first time in Seattle’s history. Because the Pro Parks levy is running out this year, the Mayor has decided to pull some additional money out of the General Fund and run it through the Pro Parks Committee for allocation. This time, the Parks Department via the Mayor is not leaving it entirely up to the Committee to allocate the funds, lest they forget something.

The Parks/Mayor’s suggestion, delivered to us via smoke signal, is that some of the $7M supplemental Parks Levy money be used for skatepark projects at Delridge, Roxhill, and Judkins Parks:

“As part of his 2008 proposed budget, Mayor Greg Nickels will infuse Seattle neighborhoods with a one-time $7 million “Orphaned Parks Wish Fund.” If adopted by the City Council, this would be one of the largest funds of its kind in the city’s history. Every neighborhood will be eligible for funding to improve its parks.

“We are fortunate to have so many beautiful and well-used parks in virtually every neighborhood in Seattle. Unfortunately, some have become orphaned over the years. This wish fund will allow people to apply for funds for their favorite park projects,” said Nickels. Applicants for funding will go through a competitive process, utilizing the existing Pro Parks Levy Opportunity Fund system.

Skateboarders in Seattle have always been treated more like stepchildren, cast aside while all the love went to those other more established recreants like Lawn Bowlers and Frisbee Golfers…but ‘orphans’ works. The real news here is that the process to secure these funds for your “favorite park project” is competitive.

Who’s in for another year-long process? (dates will obviously change but the process will be similar)