austin public skatepark action committee

APSAC’s first volunteer skate spot construction project is almost finished. Over the past few months, APSAC members have donated their labor and time to build Austin’s first public skate spot. More than $10,000 was raised in private donations to purchase materials for the construction- no city money was applied to this project. Currently, all concrete has been placed for the mini ramp, but the facility won’t officially open to the public until the grass has taken hold on the site. Until then, it will be closed.

PPMR signage

PPMR coverage in the Austin American-Statesman [Read more →]

The City of Austin is currently soliciting public input on the types of activities people would like to see supported in the future development of Waller Creek in Central Austin. The online survey doesn’t currently list ‘skateboarding‘ as an option, although it does include rollerblading. It looks like they are considering a concrete path of some sort, which could easily be designed as a skate path that would support jogging, rollerblading, bicycling, and skateboarding.

If you’d like to see more skate terrain  added to Austin’s urban landscape, take a moment to fill in the online survey and advocate for skateboarding in the Waller Creek master plan. I’ve spoken to the survey administrators about the omission of skateboarding from the activities list and they’ve said it can’t be updated as the survey is already live and it’s not possible to add it now. Our best option may be to select ‘rollerblading‘ from the activities list, then enter text in the boxes below requesting skateboarding as a Waller Creek activity.

Please encourage other skateboarders to fill out this survey.

http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/wallercreek/survey.cfm

Austin Parks and Recreation Planner, Ricardo Soliz, is conducting public input meetings to determine what improvements Austinites would like to see built in parks throughout the city. Soliz will take the suggestions and requests gathered at these meetings to compile a list of capital improvements to be included in the next City of Austin Bond Election (date to be determined).

The previous bond election yeilded a skate and BMX plaza that will be constructed later this year in House Park. This is actually a paltry accomplishment compared to the millions of dollars allocated in that bond package for such recreational expenditures as 15 new tennis courts and new golf course putting greens. That’s why it’s important for skateboarders to attend these meetings to tell the Parks and Recreation Department that we need facilities, also. Austin’s hundreds of public tennis courts, baseball diamonds, football and soccer fields sit idle every day. It’s only skatepark, Mabel Davis, is crowded EVERY day. [Read more →]

Members of the Austin Public Skatepark Action Committee attended the City of Austin Bond Advisory Public Input Meeting on December 12th to speak in support of the City allocating funds for building more public skateparks. Although more than 30 skateboarders, BMX riders, and roller skaters signed up, only three were allowed to speak due to time constraints.

The next and last hearing of the advisory committee is scheduled for January 5th. Please arrive early to ensure you can get a speaking slot early in the meeting. Here are some photos of skatepark advocates speaking at the December meeting. Even without speaking, everyone who showed up to support skateboarding, BMX, and rollerskating in Austin helped the cause a great deal. These folks deserve a huge amount of credit.

The City of Austin Bond Committee is back to taking public input. They had
been told they needed to reduce their recommended bond total from $800
million to $600 million.

City Manager, Toby Futrell and PARD Director Warren Struce informed me on Saturday that the current bond proposal did not include any money for BMX or skate facilities. This afternoon (12/7/2005), Mr. Struce called me to update me with great news. The current bond proposal DOES include $620,000 for a BMX park and $650,000 for a skatepark(s). He said it was still very important for skaters to attend these bond input meetings to ensure that these numbers do not get cut in favor of other projects people at these meetings will be lobbying for. Of all the projects people lobbied for at the last round of meetings, skate and bmx facilities received the largest turnout and with a strong turnout, we’ll guarantee that this money will be set aside so the city can add more skate stuff in other parts of the city.

So tell all your friends. Tell ‘em they don’t even need to speak. They just need to show up and fill out the form saying what they support. The first meeting is this Thursday, December 8th at 7:00 pm. The second one is on January 5th. Bring cardboard signs. Bring whatever. Show up and make a ruckus. Here’s a flyer you can print and distribute. Here’s a map to where the meeting will be held

On November 8th, Residents of Travis County, have the opportunity to vote for a bond that will include more than $500,000 for a public, concrete skatepark in Northeast Metro Park. The election is on November 8th, but early voting has already started. Here is a flyer with information about all the items included in the bond package.

The skatepark item is the result of many Austin skateboarders and BMX’ers attending public input meetings for the bond and asking for this amenity to be included.

The text refers to an in-ground skatepark in order to ensure that the implementation does not involve prefab, which is usually described
as ‘above ground.’ The design will be created at a later date, and will be the result of public input from users of the facility.

Early voting for the Travis County (public skatepark) Bond Package is underway until Friday (November 4th) afternoon. Here is a link to early voting locations. You can vote at any of those locations regardless of what part of Travis County you live in. Also, you can skip any of the other issues on the ballot. It’s BOND PROPOSITION 2 that allocates for 62+ million dollars to the building of new parks (including the Northeast Metro In-ground Skatepark) that we need to vote “FOR.”