Did not get a chance to pull together my notes yesterday, so here they are
today, before they rapidly vanish with my memory.
When I arrived at the park about 2:30 I watched for patterns with skaters, and
took a few photos. The park was at the maximum capacity with what Dee said
later was 60 skaters. Lots of spectators were there too. I inquired with Dee
about the status of the rules and he said that for now, things are up in the
air, but only helmets were required of older skaters.
I caught a glimpse of David talking to the mayor outsided the fenced area and
sauntered over. As I approached I heard "well, we paid them to build, not to
skate", and the response was "sometimes it doesn't seem that way". There was
some discussion about the rules, and should the older skaters be different, and
should different rules be in place temporarily until the youth commission
meeting on monday. The safety rules have been placed on its agenda. It was
fairly quickly decided that the long term decision would be best made after
discussion and this would take place monday night. The question was what to do
in the meantime. David, who has headed up the project was in favor of
softening the rules. The mayor retorted that once some rules are softened then
a person can feel that others can be challenged -- why after all should some
rules be enforced and not others? -- and that this puts the park on a slippery
slope. Contributing to the discussion was the person in charge of the youth
commission, J, and the issues of enforcement by the skatepark guards, who are
under 18, came up, such as 18 year olds having to "card" 35 year olds to make
sure they were over 18. This was too much to ask of the guards. M expressed
that this is why they need a blanket policy. With David's appeal, M agreed
that for the day, only those under 18 would need the full complement of pads --
over 18 helmets only were required. However, for the rest of the weekend --
until the youth commission meeting, full pads would then be required. J, the
youth coordinator would make the announcement concerning the rules, and also
annouce the meeting monday night, which would be a fully open process with
anyone who wanted to venture an opinion welcome to join the discussion.
When the announcement was made, Steph became wide eyed with apparent
astonishment, but she and Geth stayed for the ceremonies, and they and the rest
of the airspeed team were publically congratulated on their accomplishment.
David also mentioned that there were a lot of people who contributed to the
park's success but he did not name them, instead he rolled out a printout that
was about 12 pages of 8x11 paper taped together (photo).
The ribbon cutting was done by a skateboard stunt -- the skater making a
transition across the 'knife=edge' between the advanced and the intermediate
bowls. The ribbon was stretched across the ridge for the skater to break as he
ollied over the ridge.
photo: http://people.ne.mediaone.net/barowy/sp/8.3/8.3.html
Stephanie later joined the others in skating, and I exclaimed "the first
official girl skater", and someone else said "no, there have been two others".
With the park being crowded, I noted a lot of turn-taking going on, with the
person who had his/her board on the metal rail the next to go. Spectators who
found themselves in the way of a skater were at risk -- skaters apparently had
the right of way. So... I thought, there were rules. I mentioned this to a
skater, and he said it is skatepark etiquette.
Later, I found myself talking to M, about the culture of skaters, transgressing
space and structure -- she replied "i've come to realize that". and I mentioned
that what skaters seem to be upset about are rules imposed by the outside, but
they they do obey internally generated rules -- like turn taking. A younger
skater who had come up with his mother (who is on the FNSP private committee)
said "yeah, that's etiquette, so that people don't get hurt. M motioned J to
come over and we repeated the observations for him.
Later, it occured to me that this could be an opportunity to engage skaters in
the process of developing the full etiquette for the park. Right now, out of my
open window, I hear some chearing, and so I'm going over to investigate.
bb
=====
"One of life's quiet excitements is to stand somewhat apart from yourself and watch yourself softly become the author of something beautiful."
[Norman Maclean in "A river runs through it."]
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Oct 01 2001 - 01:01:57 PDT