Skateboarders and trials riders are coming together to try to ensure each can have a place to practice their sport when the weather gets wet.
Last Tuesday (July 25), Port Moody council encouraged them to do just that, voting unanimously to task staff to investigate future opportunities for a covered skateboard park in the city while also preserving and even promoting the existing trials park beneath the Moody Street overpass.
The wheeled detente comes after representatives from both sports spoke passionately of their need for covered facilities following a pitch by local pro skateboarder, pastor and motivational speaker Dave Jonsson that the park where cyclists practise their precise balancing skills doesn’t get much use and would better serve the booming skateboard community.
Sam Ki Han Song, who travels from Vancouver once a week to teeter his bike slowly atop the course of scored logs, rocks, giant truck tires and stacked boxes that was constructed by Port Moody Rotary in 2009, said there’s room for both sports.
“It doesn’t necessarily have to be one group getting displaced and the other coming in.”
Song was one of several trials riders who attended the meeting to defend their sport and the importance of the park beneath the overpass that is the only one of its kind in Canada and one of only two in North America.
“You have a special place here,” said one, proclaiming it a destination for trials riders from all over the world.
Another, who called in to the meeting from Edmonton, said the facility is key to fostering the sport’s growth as it allows riders to improve their skills gradually.
“It’s such an instrumental place in the progression of so many riders,” he said.
Jonsson, whose Skate Undercover movement to secure a sheltered skateboard area somewhere in the Tri-Cities had previously received cool receptions at Coquitlam and Port Coquitlam councils, said the passion of the trials riders actually gives him hope something can be done that will please both groups.
“I think that’s what got council, was the heart of both the skateboarders and the trials riders,” he said, adding the meeting was “an incredible step forward.”
In fact, for many councillors, the passion surrounding the trials park proved a bit of a revelation.
“I’m impressed that the bike trials area is known throughout the world,” said Mayor Meghan Lahti, who noted the existing concrete skateboard park just a little further east along Murray Street is coming to the end of its useful life and will be due for a refresh or rebuild anyway. “I don’t believe it’s an either/or situation.”
“I really hope we look into ways to leverage this uniqueness,” added Coun. Kyla Knowles. “This could be a major opportunity for us.”
Song said such words give him hope his sport might be able to gain further traction in the community.
“It doesn’t look special to someone who isn’t involved.”
Jonsson said while there’s still much work to be done, “At the end of the night, both groups were happy.”
