St Cleer Skate Park Project

To provide a park suitable for all wheeled sports, and all levels of ability. A safe but challenging environment.

There were no facilities for young people in the parish apart from formal games and the Girl Guides and Brownies packs. There are no Youth workers in the rural parishes and young people are not able to travel the 3 miles to Liskeard to access services provided in the town.

The people of the parish requested a Skate park on several previous occasions and following the approach of 20 young people to the Parish Council in November 2003, the Parish Projects Group decided that they would take up the project, seek funding and if successful, manage the installation of the park on land at St Cleer Sportsfield.

When the park was complete it was handed to St Cleer Parish Council to manage and maintain for the future. They gave written confirmation of their willingness to do this and to allow the park to be built on their land.

The total cost was £61,000 the work was split into two phases consisting of a skating base area and the lower level equipment followed by a half pipe on the upper area. We worked with the skaters preferred supplier Rhino Ramps to complete the project which was opened in August 2004.

Click here to view a list of the Skatepark funders.

Skating for Real - St Cleer, Saturday 13th March 2004

The Skating for Real day held at the Sportsfield St Cleer was designed to find out exactly what the young people of the parish wanted put in place.

The Parish Council had already agreed that the park could be built on land at the Sportsfield but wanted to know which part of the field was most suitable.

The Parish projects Group which had agreed to look for funding and to administer the bids and build wanted to know what equipment was required and the area it would cover.

The objects of the day were therefore:-

• to choose a site.
• to design the park and prioritise the phases.

The event was attended by 26 skaters and 13 interested members of the public, including 8 parents. The event was staged by 8 facilitators and helpers which included officers of Caradon District Council, Cornwall Rural Community Council, the Police and members of the Parish Projects Group. Several Parish Councillors also came along during the day.

Choosing the site.

Four possible sites had been identified and these were each visited by a group of young people accompanied by a facilitator to complete the check list.

Site 1 Part of the car park
Although the easiest to access and the quickest to install the loss of the area for parking would cause severe problems for users of the other facilities. Noise might also cause a nuisance to houses a short distance away.

Site 2 Lower area near MUGA
This site was too small and had trees which would need removal.

Site 3 Lower far corner
Although large enough the site was tucked away from the main area and would be difficult to access for emergency services. Close proximity to a dwelling might result in noise nuisance.

Site 4 Upper far corner
The site had plenty of room was far from any dwellings but had a good visibility from the Pavilion and if the hedge was taken down from the top of the boundary wall from the road. Access would be straightforward for emergency vehicles should the need arise.

A vote was taken and the majority considered that site 4 was the most suitable and it was chosen as the preferred site.

Workshops

After lunch the skaters once again split into groups to move round the various workshops

• Research on design – was conducted by studying suppliers brochures and using a CD ROM of existing schemes
• Logo Design – was undertaken using various mediums on paper. One was chosen for use on the project documents.
• SkatePark designs were drawn by skaters to show what equipment would be desirable if funding permitted their installation.
• Equipment suitable for all wheeled sports (BMX and In line skating as well as boards were chosen)
• Girls should be encouraged to use the site.

As the site chosen already has two levels it was felt that the installation of a skating surface on these two levels with roll in ramps and a flight of steps with grind rails linking them would be an excellent outcome.

If and when further finance could be obtained a fun box, quarter pipes and a flat bank could be added to provide extra challenges.

The skaters also suggested ways in which they might be able to help with some fundraising activities, and three of them have agreed to join the Projects Group and become involved with the work.

Comments written by skaters.

• The park is insanely good and its really good fun to ride and skate
• This is so sick and is great to ride
• Really good, amazing, brilliant
• Magically fantastic
• I am frilled to have the new park and I feel it will help all of us progress
• The 8th wonder of the world
• This is the kind of act from the council that shows they care about young dudes and their crazy fun
• Olympics here comes sk8ing
• Hellish sk8ing, best ever
• COOL SK8.

More images of this project can be found in our gallery section