Skate community up in arms

THE Bass Coast Shire Council’s Skate Park Strategy is out and was adopted by council at last month’s council meeting, but the skating community aren’t overly happy with the results. 

As Cr Bruce Kent mentioned in the meeting, the community will be ‘bitterly disappointed’ and that they were. 

Despite being in favour of the current Kilcunda skate park project that is underway and due for completion in September of this year, the locals of Newhaven, Cape Woolamai and San Remo feel short changed. Sharing their disappointment with council’s decision was local Buckey Hamer who has been lobbying for a competition skatepark for over 10 years. 

“I want to share that I am so happy that Kilcunda are getting their park and they probably wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for our continuous voice standing up for the skating community, but the need for a competitive skatepark still remains.”

Bucky explained that the kids that were skating when he started raising awareness around the issue are all grown up now, and they’ve had to travel out of town to skate for their entire childhood. He didn’t think it would still be the case for the next generation. 

To be heard by council 10 years ago, Bucky had a community of over 2000 members behind him – a group known as 4shore Sk8 writing to council to keep their voice heard, in hopes of getting a ‘regional’ skate park for competition level skaters.

But all that noise seems to be ignored.  

In 2018, Bass MP Jordan Crugnale announced $650,000 for the ‘regional’ skatepark in San Remo and despite the project falling due to the location being unsuitable, council picked the project up and the Grayden’s Reserve concept design was launched – a design that had the skating community excited for what’s to come. 

The project would have included a junior bowl, an intermediate bowl, and a feature bowl – an all-inclusive skatepark that invited all levels of skaters to challenge their skills. 

The design still considered the playground for all ages and the communal areas for the public to be close to amenities.

With overwhelming support for the project – it then collapsed due to the size of the design. 

Bucky said a well-designed skate park should be able to accommodate equal amount of use for challenge and fun – allowing skaters to build on their skillset, but with the ‘sub-regional’ and local design there will just be a limit to what can be achieved and that’s disappointing. 

“Council downgraded the regional skatepark instead of looking into what the community needed, there should have been a street inspired element and a transition bowl.” 

Community member Troy Joyner has been campaigning with Bucky for many years, just trying to get the council’s attention on the matter – and before this strategy was released, they were asking council to at least meet them in the middle. 

With the new local design for Newhaven that will go out to community consultation, Deputy Mayor Cr Rochelle Halstead is urging all the community to put in their feedback. 

Troy explained that each generation wants to be able to travel to their skatepark safely. 

“The skate strategy produced by the Bass Coast Shire Council using their own research and findings back in 2018, showed urgent need for a skate facility to service our growing and high tourism area of Newhaven and San Remo.

“They stated it would need to meet the needs of not just beginners but the entire skate community, all the way through to advanced skaters to allow for progression, with an aim to have it completed by 2023 at the latest.”

Now five years on and over a decade of community dedication and campaigning, the skate community will continue to stand up and advocate for the future of skating.