FAIRBANKS — The Jimmy O’Connor Park in North Pole took a quantum leap this summer, offering about 20 new features for skateboarders and making it a premier skate park in the Fairbanks North Star Borough.
And it’s just the beginning, according to a leader in the newly formed Fairbanks Skateboard Coalition. Improvements are being planned at the John Weaver Memorial Skatepark near the Carlson Center in Fairbanks, and Erik Setterberg, of the Fairbanks Skateboard Coalition, said the group is planning to lead an effort to build a new skate park in Fairbanks.
On Saturday, a celebration and fundraiser are planned at the Jimmy O’Connor Park, at the corner of west Fifth Avenue and the Old Richardson Highway in North Pole.
The event includes skateboard and BMX competitions with cash prizes. Skateboard contest warmups are at 1 p.m., and the cookout starts at 2 p.m.
“We are going to introduce (the park) to the whole community,” Setterberg said.
It all started last summer, when the city of North Pole got a call from Eielson Air Force Base. The Air Force had some skateboard ramps that it was looking to unload so it could redesign the skate park into a multi-use space.
“It wasn’t being utilized much,” said Charlotte Lewis, chief of Airman & Family Services. “Our youth center is sitting right next to it. We wanted to make it more versatile.”
The city of North Pole snatched up the equipment — mainly ramps — and put it in storage while they decided what to do with it. Lewis valued the equipment at about $30,000.
Last spring, about the time the Borough Assembly was starting to deal with its annual budget, a group of skateboarders attended an assembly meeting to testify about the aging John Weaver Memorial Skatepark, which is overseen by the borough.
The skaters spoke about the need for better, safer and more-modern equipment to skate on.
North Pole Mayor Bryce Ward was at that meeting. He thought about the skateboarding ramps his city had in storage.
“We wanted to install it but we didn’t know how to install it,” Ward said. “It was a really good example of being in the right place at the right time.”
Ward approached the skateboarders and a partnership formed.
“They were the ones to tell us where to put stuff to make it work together,” Ward said. “It was really just this amazing sequence of events that came together .”
The skaters started by cleaning the park, including eliminating trash and graffiti, Ward said.
Then a couple of dozen skaters spent a Saturday helping lay out and install the new ramps.
“We worked out there for, like, five or six hours, and then we skated it for like an hour afterward,” Setterberg said. “The skate park before had three features; now it has 23 features. It’s now one of the best skate parks in our borough.”
Ward said, as a result, the park has grown in popularity, drawing crowds of skaters on sunny days after school.
Lewis, of Eielson, said she was glad the equipment was finally getting some use.
“We were very happy to share,” she said. “It just wasn’t get the use here on base.”
The skateboard coalition is raising money to improve the skate park in Fairbanks, Setterberg said.
Contact staff writer Amanda Bohman at 459-7587. Follow her on Twitter:
@FDNMborough.
