The City of Baltimore has approximately 29,322 skaters. The square footage of terrain needed to recreate for an audience of this size is at least 44,000 square feet of total terrain. (SAM) Presently Baltimore only has one public concrete outdoor skatepark, Carroll Park, which is less then 10,000 square feet. The current facilities available fails to meet the needs of Baltimore’s skateboarding population because of its size.
If your city doesn’t have a skate park, your city IS a skate park.
A particular incident drew my attention to the plight of our youth skateboarders in January 2008. A Youtube video depicting a Baltimore City Police Officer berating and manhandling a teenage skateboarder at the Inner Harbor, where skateboarding is not permitted, garnered negative local and national attention in the media. The incident shows that Baltimore’s youth are being underserved by the lack of facilities to safely recreate.
A rich heritage
- Maryland boasts a rich skateboarding history which includes the home of some of the oldest skateparks in the United States; Lansdowne, in Baltimore County, Maryland and Ocean Bowl, in Ocean City Maryland.
- The State is also hometown to one of the most widely recognized skateboarders in the World, Bucky Lasek who is a X-Games champion.
- In 2007 and 2008 Baltimore was the first stop on the Mountain Dew Action Sports Tour, this five-city tour brought over 50,000 visitors to the Raven’s Stadium parking lot in one weekend.