The Roots
Anyone who knows about skateboarding will tell you that the roots are in pools. Skateboarding really developed as a sport when wheels hit transitions. Transitions are fun. This is why today, most street contests look like someone hacked up a vert ramp with a chainsaw and spread it around a car park. In 1972, the only way to skate a transition was to find an empty pool or find a drainage ditch.
Then the Skateparks arrived in the first boom. Some were legendary, like Upland , Del Mar and Romford. Others were less well designed : Tijuana, Knebworth and Derby park are good examples. The bowls were deep and the shapes were wild as lack of knowledge competed with a surplus of concrete and cash. Some of the purpose built skateparks were harder to skate than backyard pools. A core of riders became famous for their ability to take the techniques learned in backyard pools and apply them to purpose built parks. Names like Salba, Tony Alva, Duane Peters, Christian Hosoi, Steve Cabalero and Tony Hawk became synonymous with pool skating.
Today, pools are hard to find and a lot of the concrete parks no longer exist as authorities demolish them, replacing them with mini ramps which are easier to make and remove and where the risk of lawsuits is smaller.
It takes courage and a lot of money to build a concrete park. It takes real know-how to build a great one.
The authorities in Marseille had all three and in large helpings when they built theirs.
Because of it's scarcity, concrete has become something special. When the pros compete in Europe, they head straight to Marseille after the prizes have been given out, because concrete is still the best and Marseille rips. This was a top level international competition in the park that everyone loves to skate.
