Category: Skateboarding

This Saturday will see a new skate park open in London and the opening day will be celebrated by many locals in Southwark.

An opening jam is cheduled for 1-6pm organized by Play Services at The Arch, called “Whites Grounds” and is located between Druid Street and Crucifix Lane.

Appointed local architects, Dive, who designed the overall project in consultation with local communities won an RIBA (Royal Institute of British Architects) award for the second best un-built design in London.

The actual skatable space, the shape and form was designed by Rich Holland from The Side Effects of Urethane collaborating with Dive who created drawings from a scale model and oversaw production.

The skatepark will be monitored and supervised by Southwark Council Play Services and will be open from this Saturday, so get down there.

Opening Day Schedule

1 to 1.30 – Introductions, ribbon cutting and press photos
1.30 to 2pm – Refresments and demo sessions by experts (hah!)
2pm to 3.30 – Best tricks sessions and prize giving
3.30 to 4pm – User Registration
4pm – 6pm – Open skate session

A brand new concrete bowl has been opened by Maidstone Borough Council at a spot aptly called South Park.

The prefabricated bowl was built by Hags, their first attempt at building a concrete park and by all accounts it is fun to skate, so say our friends at LovenSkate.Looks like another option is now open for Southern skaters this summer, keep them coming!

More info here.

Email messages sent by Mark Appleyard and Geoff Rowley this week to database subscribers have raised questions of their authenticity amongst forums posters around the world.

Rowley’s email read:“As of immediately, I am no longer able to endorse Active mail order as a team rider. Differences of opinion and direction have been a problem for quite some time and I am quitting for my own ethical reasons. I will be concentrating my focus on my main sponsors, and working with them to support the bigger picture of skateboarding as a whole”.

Crossfire can confirm after speaking to Geoff himself that these emails are 100% genuine and that both riders have indeed parted company with Active mailorder in the US.

Up in Mansfield, the locals got a lot more from the Easter Bunny than some pansy ass chocolate. They got ripped apart by various hardcore, noisecore, whatevercore bands such as Plague, Battle Of Balaclava and Army Of Flying Robots.

Put together by The Lurking Hole and Audio Montage, the day was a full on fest of carnage! To see how everyone should have celebrated their Easter Sunday, then check the pictures from the day here.

www.thelurkinghole.com

London skaters will be happy to hear that Bay Sixty6 Skatepark has started to rebuild the street course that was severely fire damaged last year leaving the back of the park a smouldering wreck.

The new street course will take about 6-7 weeks to finish and work started this weekend. Plans for the park will be revealed hopefully this week so you can see what is going to be built. The designs came from various open sessions with input from locals, the UKSA and key input from John at Freestyle.

Let’s hope the park can be ready in time for the opening party scheduled for Saturday June 9th, expect a large celebration at the park as they will celebrate 10 years of being up and running!

Fairfields has been one of England’s traditional spots for decades now. The time has come to defend what, without a doubt, belongs to the skaters in and out of Croydon. A ‘no skating’ ban on the area looks very likely to be implemented upon this haven soon.

This is clearly the LAST place the Croydon Council should be looking into to sort out trouble. Please do your bit to help save a classic British skate spot by signing this petition.

Fairfields Forever!

Jerry – Backside Nose Grind
Ph. by Gorm.

Independent Trucks sent out a press release last week welcoming Ryan Sheckler to their team, but it seems that they may have jumped the gun as Silver released this image via their PR peeps this weekend.

Rumours in the US state that this could have had something to do with an April Fools gag but we are not so sure. One thing we have been made aware of though is that Sheckler has an exisiting contract with Silver who say he still rides for them. We will bring you more news of this when both companies sort their shit out!

In the meantime look out for the kid soon though as he will be just one of the riders present on the Plan B UK Tour alongside Danny Way, Colin McKay and co in June – details of the full line up will be found on this very site soon. You will then be able to tell what truck company he is riding for first hand!

Within the inner sanctum at Sidewalk Magazine lies a beast only known as the ‘Horse‘. He is the creature responsible for bringing you monthly viewing pleasure and works non stop to bring you the mag once all the stuff has been collated.

In his spare time though he comes up with concepts such as riding chocolate horses to name just one, but his new and most approved idea is Pegnet – a game that will ensure that boredom will never find a place in your crappy garden ever again…Pegnet!

Already, skaters in the know have become obsessed with the new wave of extreme sports gnarlyness. Paul Rimmer is quoted to say: “I’m a little shocked to tell you the truth… It feels like the search is over. Meaning has prevailed in my life via the awe inspiring appearance of pegnetting… I’m trying to remain calm…but I need some quetions answered. Where can I get my first peg and net from? Are there any specific pegnet shops yet? How can I find out about other pegnetters in my area? Are there pegnetting groups and will there be a pegnet pro team at some point? Is pegnetting international or is it a British sport at the moment?”

Click here to find out more about the phenomenon that has swept Leicester over night….oh and good luck with your netting!

Louie Barletta, Caswell Berry and Nestor Judkins stopped by the UK for a five days earlier this month with Jason Adams dropping by for the last two.

A couple of days were spent in the suburbs of London, there was a surprise visit to the Stokeplaza and the likes of Birmingham, Nottingham and Wolverhampton were squeezed into the mission.

Louie and Caswell were sore and hurting from their Germany stop but still managed to come through with the goods…and it has all been snapped and documented for issue #129 of Sidewalk.

You just wait – The spots and tricks are absolutely crackers.

www.enjoico.com

Words: Parrott – Ph: Horsely