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The voice of skaters' experience

Skaters will get their say on the design of a Dunedin skate park. Unlike the old one, it will be made of concrete.

By TIFFANI SHERMAN
Published June 28, 2006

DUNEDIN - Kenny Bianco wants to see a roll-in into a half pipe, plus both street and "vert" elements so he can practice his kick flip.

The language might seem strange, but the skaters who will use Dunedin's new skate park once it's built know exactly what they want.

Bianco, 14, of Dunedin and others will be able to tell park designers and city planners their thoughts at a public meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Martin Luther King Jr. Recreation Center.

"What I hope to accomplish is to get the input that will help us come up with the design that will best serve the skating public," said Harry Gross, Dunedin's director of leisure services. "There are a lot of kids who've been waiting for this skate park, and I hope they can use it before they have to use it with their kids."

The city's old skate park closed about three years ago. Even though it was built only three years before, the wooden ramps deteriorated quickly in the elements, Gross said. When it was open, about 50 to 75 people skated at the park on weekday evenings and about 100 a day came on the weekends.

"It was very popular when they had the skate park," said Jason Seeley, 26, a program coordinator who oversees the MLK Recreation Center and will oversee the new skate park when it opens.

"It was no longer safe to operate the skate park with the equipment they had," said Seeley, who has been with the city for about nine months.

So the city tore it down.

Jared Wilson, 23, of Dunedin, said he is looking forward to a local skate park. Now he said he has to drive to Indian Rocks Beach to skate.

"If Dunedin was done or they didn't rip out the old one I would be there often," he said. "It will help a lot of the shop owners from having to chase kids off all the time. There will be a lot more skating, it will be more convenient, a lot closer and I know most of the people who will end up there."

City officials aim to create "a better (skate park) this time, one that's going to last," Gross said. He said the new park will probably cost about $250,000 to $270,000, paid for with proceeds from a previous land sale. It will be made of concrete this time, not wood, and will sit on the same 9,500-square-foot site where the old park was, but will look nothing like it.

"These facilities are a lot like golf courses," said Tito Porrata, 32, of Team Pain, an Orlando skate park design company that won the bid for the Dunedin project along with Charlotte Engineering.

Porrata has been skateboarding for about 20 years.

"You wouldn't want to see the same golf course two places," he said.

This park will probably be a flow-type course.

"You have many corners and hits that you can go in any direction you want," Porrata said. "You can flow inside it, you can drop in and start anywhere you want."

Since concrete facilities last for about 20 years, the course needs to be designed for the future.

"We try to offer a challenging environment for skaters of all ages and levels," Porrata said. "You have to pay attention to the design so it challenges the users for many years to come."

Thursday's meeting will give skaters a chance to look at Team Pain's plans and voice their opinions. "It will give us a first-hand look at the users," Porrata said. Team Pain has designed concrete parks in a dozen Florida cities including one in St. Petersburg. The company has also built the ramps for the X Games for about eight years.

Once the city finishes the design, officials will put the project out to bid for construction. If all goes well, Dunedin's new park will be open in the early spring, later than Gross hoped.

"The process to get where we are now with the new skate park has taken a lot longer than we thought," he said. "Ultimately we'll get the park we want instead of settling for something in the interest of getting it done quickly," Gross said.

No opening date will be soon enough for skaters like Kenny Bianco, an incoming Countryside High freshman who skates on the streets outside his home two to three times a week.

"It's a good source of self-accomplishment because you can always learn a new trick or make one up," he said.

Bianco wants a place to practice so he can get better.

"Trust me, I've busted my butt a lot of times."

IF YOU GO
What: Skate park public meeting.

When: 7p.m. Thursday

Where: Martin Luther King Junior Recreation Center, 550 Laura Lane, Dunedin.

Information: (727) 738-2920 

[Last modified June 28, 2006, 07:01:07]