Online Petition Thing For London Park...

[Mark W]

No real details yet, apart from the tasty looking pics. I'd assumed it is manned, simply because of the no-BMX rule. It's unlikely they'd make that sort of claim, then not have anyone there to enforce it, unless the GLC are even stupider than I thought?

The thing with the park is that there's so many wallride opportunities and stuff like that which skaters simply won't be able to make the most of just because of the way tiny rattly wheels don't roll over brick too well, not to mention all the transfer lines they won't be able to do because they can't get enough speed. f**k, every skatepark I've been to when it's just being skated by skaters look like it's nowhere near to fulfiling it's potential. I'm not saying that just because I'm a BMXer, but it just seems there's a huge gulf between pro and am skaters, and am skaters generally just don't really tend to use stuff to it's full effect. Meh, we'll see what happens with this. Even if it is skate only, they said that about the blocks at Southbank but now the skater locals have realised that because we ride BMX we aren't necessarily going to give htem cancer or whatever they're more OK about it now...

Oh, and Jon Mac - I've been f**ked over more by skaters at skateparks than BMXers. The worst thing is just having skaters ghost their boards (Which most of them deliberately do?). With a BMX, if you f**k up a trick unless there's some mad luck involved they just tumble over. Skateboards carry on, just rolling through everything. I've almost been taken down two or three times just from airing something and finding a deck rolling calmly into my landing spot. That's never happened with a BMXer. Equally, the only collissions I've had from people cutting me up have been skaters, who seem to fully lack any sort of spacial awareness in skatepark environments. Equally, judging from the blocks at Southbank, metal trucks to just a good a job of f**king coping up as pegs do, but all the grind-able ledges at that plaza appear to be angle iron, meaning pegs wouldn't do anything to it anyway. There's really no reason not to let BMXers in, at all.

To whoever asked, the reason skaters get what they want more is just from councils not understanding the whole *shudders* "Extreme" sports world, and thinking that because it says "Skate"park it's for "Skate"boarders. Whereas that's not actually the case at all, with the first parks being built for rollerskaters and stuff, it's stuck. The Side Effects Of Urethane were also commissioned to design it, and although BMXers offered to help, they were turned away saying they didn't need any help. At that point, it was to be open to all. At the end of the process, they changed their minds, and cited a lack of help and initiative from BMXers as being just one of the reasons (not that they listed many, at all...) for not allowing BMXers in.

Politics is awesome.