City of Calgary seeks partnership to continue mobile skatepark program

Calgary's Community Mobile Skatepark program could make a 180, after it was put on pause this summer due to budget constraints a welcome piece of news for the city's skateboarding community.

The then city-run program started22 years ago in 1997 but the concept has been going much longer. Between themid-1980s and 1990, three mobile ramps operated periodically as a grassroots, community-led way to givepeople better access to skateboard parks before Calgary had one.

Daniel Craig is on the board of the Calgary Association of Skateboarding Enthusiasts.

"We would love for the program to continue, of course, in the way that it was, it was very well received," he said."The communities were very receptive to the parks being there. And it was a lot of fun. And so to see them end was bad. It looks like there's some hope to restart and that's really good for us. We like that."

The city's put up a notice for agencies to express interest in buying out the skate equipment. The notice says that any interested party would be accountable to the city fora five-year period.

Afterward, "the agency can do what they want with the equipment," according to the posting.

Craig says it's encouraging but there are still questions.

"Maybe they continue it on their ownmaybe they don't, maybe the ramps aren't any good after five years, who knows what sort of wear and tear is going to happen or how old they are now, I'm not too sure," Craig said. "There'sdefinitely some questions after the five years, what's going to happen to the program?"

City wants ramps to stay local

CBC News was not able to connect with the city for an interview in time for publication. In an email, a city spokesperson provided some background information to clarify details of the city's request forinterested vendors.

The spokesperson wrotethe city wants an agency to use the skatepark materials for their original intent and will work collaboratively with successful applicants to re-create the program.

After five years, the ramps will be fully owned by that company and it can choose what to do with the materials.

The city hopesthe ramps will continue to benefit Calgarians.

Parks were pulled amid city-wide budget cuts

Every spring and summer, the city rotated several mobile skateboard parks throughout communities with little or noaccess to permanent parks.

Each location hadstaff on hand to supervise, along with scheduled lessons for little ones.

A notice was posted tothe Community Mobile Skateparkswebpage last summer to notify users that there was no money to continue the program, and on Sept. 5, the program ended. Thatpage has since been taken down.

"Community mobile skateparks will no longer be offered," read the city's notice. "Skateboarding enthusiasts will still have opportunities for participation at several of ourpermanent skateparkslocated across Calgary."