When I was a teenager my friends were a buzz about a brand new skate park in my hometown. We were the perfect age for it too, in that time the X-games, skateboarding, roller skating etc. were really hitting a surge.
With the massive appeal of video games and the charismatic (at least as far as skateboarders go) Tony Hawk a place dubbed an extreme park was a dream come true. Then, when we discovered that the park would be one of the biggest parks of its kind in the country my friends had to pick their jaws up from the floor.
As far as I go, I can’t exactly how should I say this? Stand up on a skateboard, let alone do 360’s, flips, and all of the other ridiculous stunts I saw kids across the country doing through tape trading.
At that time, the X-games were really the only major broadcast of extreme sports so a lot of the stunts kids would end up hurting themselves trying to do were discovered via copies of videos that kids would put together. This did leave an opportunity for me, as a film geek this gave me an opportunity to really play around with shooting, editing, dubbing and all that sort of stuff and everybody would think I was cool if I could make them look good, simply put: I was on board.
And, so was the city when the park established itself, beaconing those stars of biking and skateboarding including but certainly not limited to Tony Hawk himself who was filming Tony Hawk’s Secret Skateboard tour which highlighted the park.
Today, the park with its 40,000 square feet of ramps and the like still calls out for locals and nationals.
The exact future of the park is kind of up in the air at the moment, due to concerns relating to the Kennedy Interchange but regardless it’s an important part at least for a ten year span in local sports.
Outside Sources
Image courtesy of Hello Louisville
