Jacksonville Go Skate Day
06/21/06 • Posted in: Downtown Jacksonville, Events, Southbank by Joey Marchy 10 Comments »
My boy Levi from Urban Art Warfare reminded me that today is National Go Skate Day. Flatline Skateboards, 904skate, and Skatejax have teamed up for Jacksonville’s first annual go skate day. So grab your skate and head Downtown.
If you want to participate, meet up at 3:00pm in Friendship Park on the Southbank. There will also be a BBQ, product toss and giveaways.
I read that JSO gave a bunch kids a hard time today. I hope that is just hearsay. I mean, these kids aren’t doing drugs or stealing; they are just out in the streets getting good excercise, practicing and enjoying what they do: skateboarding.
If I was still working in the Modis Building, I would have been there for sure.
i heard people saying very specific rumors they heard about kids having problems with the JSO today (including a nightmarish story about an 11 year old being beaten [!?]), so i’m guessing there was at least some non-neglible interference. we still have a long way to move forward.
btw, why do skateboarders have such an awful reputation that its not alarming for them to be unfairly hassled by law enforcement? i’m missing the connection that allows them to be negatively profiled. is it an association with graffiti?
Here is a link to the article on the Times Union.
Fine day for skateboarding
It sounds like a bunch of skater got tickets. Sucks, the police should have been providing air cover so the skaters could have their day. Next time they should coordinate with JSO so the cops know whats up instead of being suprised at 300 kids with skateboards showing up downtown.
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I don’t skate, but what’s the big deal? Imo, them being around actually improves the vibe of downtown.
Lakelander,
The main problem the community has with skateboarders is the destruction of public property. Blackend, waxy curbs and ledges, scarred handrails and benches are the main reason why the city does not support skateboarding downtown. Not to mention the liability issue of being injured on public property.
Aside from the urban scarring, many people feel skateboarders are a menace. The general public, and the city especially, feel as if skateboarders threaten the safety and well-being of the public, almost to the extent of thuggary.
This of course is untrue. All skateboarders really want to do is skate.
So why not construct a stake park in downtown? We have plenty of pocket parks that are failures as good urban spaces. After all, the city’s goal is to become more “family friendly”. Skateboarders are apart of our family and community. If we can’t establish and accept diversity downtown, then where?
In reply of Joey and thelakelanders discussion. , that was the whole purposese of the event, to try to get some recognition for a downtown park.k . after many emails and discussions with kids and parents of the downtown eraIn reply of Joey and thelakelanders discussion, that was the whole purposese of the event, to try to get some recognition for a downtown park. after many emails and discussions with kids and parents of the downtown area, who have tried to get some type of a legal place to skate thru the city officials and have come up nothing but empty handed over the years, we decided to use national go skate day as a fine time to get some recognition of the number of kids who skate downtown. now the papers and the cops all made it seem like all we would have had to of done was get a permit, but they’re not give you a permit to do something that is deemed illegal in the first place. in there eyes that would be the same as giving a crackhead a permit to sell crack for a day. So instead of picket signs we just used our skateboards. It did get a little out of hand in the streets, but we warned them if they stop our protest in friendship that we would take it to the streets. we couldn’t give up that easy and after talkin to all the kids that went and being there myself, it felt really good being apart of a protest that ended up with a ton of kids skating down the streets at once. and also in our defense, we werent pissed at the cops doing there jobs but the majority of kids who got slammed on the ground and put in cuffs were the kids who picked up there boards and submitted to the polices orders. it was just excessive force i thought. later levi
im raw!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://skatesos.org/component/option,com_frontpage/Itemid,1/
Trying to bring it to SPR…