Forty-five truckloads of debris went out, 18 loads of road base came in, and then 16 cement trucks and three pump trucks laid 150 yards of concrete to expand terrain at the Wasatch County Skatepark at Southfield Park in Heber City.
The skatepark closed, of course, when construction began in the last week of May, reopening last week. The park’s fenced borders remain the same, but every blade of grass within the fence was replaced by concrete.
Wasatch Parks and Recreation hired RS Construction to complete the buildout, the company’s first skateboard project.
“We poured concrete around the whole outside then redid all the pool coping,” company owner Riley Snelson said. “The pool coping wasn’t lasting here in the freeze-thaw climate. It kept popping out. So we did the metal railing like with everything else. We also did a flat rail that’s a little shorter. They’ve already got a lot of big, crazy stuff, so we did some soft, easier stuff for the younger kids.”
The new sections of the park are a lighter color gray than the original build, and have a slight brush for traction. The gentle new curves skirt the southeast side of the park and provide easier passage around the perimeter while avoiding steeper obstacles. The new concrete also offers more spacious approach angles toward existing features.
“We broomed it really light so it’s got a texture, but as minimal as possible,” Snelson said.
Twenty riders on skateboards, scooters, bicycles and roller blades were cruising around the park on the reopening evening June 16, gaining a feel for the new flows.
Eighteen-year-old Lucas Nelson has been skating for six years and visits the park weekly.
“I’m a fan of that rail they added,” Nelson said. “For the most part I think it’s great. I’m a little torn apart that they put concrete right there where there was a little feature you could hit.”
He pointed to what had been a waxed concrete edge beside grass where he used to catch grinds.. The low flat rail sits where the grass island within the park once was.
Jennifer Bowman is the marketing coordinator for Wasatch County Parks and Recreation who worked on the revamp funded by a Wasatch Trails, Arts and Parks (TAP) Grant.
The skateboard park was popular, she said. “We found that out about a year and a half ago. We actually shut down the park for vandalism last spring and we looked to the community for information on what we could do to better the park, better the security and overall just better experience for our users.”
A public forum attracted about 150 people, she said.
“We really had no idea what to expect, but when you make a big move like shutting something down, you really find out how popular something is,” she said. “And it truly is. You go there any day of the week, there are kids there.”
The park expanded hours until 10 p.m., thanks to electricity, and will be dependent on good user behavior.
“We are going to turn the lights back on when we reopen the park,” Bowman said. “Heber City does have an ordinance in place that we have to shut them off by 10 p.m. nightly. If there is any kind of vandalism, inappropriate behavior, bullying, we will go back to no lights, open dawn to dusk, but we’re going to try.”
