Skaters find a slice of home and an excellent escape at Fire Station Skate Park
A Southern California family found some semblance of home at the newly opened Fire Station Skate Park on May 8.
April Keller and her skateboarder sons moved less than a year ago to North Texas from Southern California, a place where the skateboarding scene remains hot and is rooted in young people.
“In California, there’s this big scene,” Keller said. “Their friends in California are also raving about this park. They asked if they had been to the new skate park here. We’re trying to get them to come here.”
The Fire Station Skate Park at Dickies Skate Plaza opened April 29 at 1610 Hemphill St. Prior to its opening, skaters would jump over a fence to skate on the park’s many features, including a pump track, designed to allow skaters to maintain momentum without pushing.
Will Landes, 40, a resident of the Berkeley Place neighborhood, is excited about the new skate plaza in the heart of Fort Worth.
“There really aren’t any parks in the middle of Fort Worth. I would have to drive to Granbury, or Frisco, Lewisville and places like that to go skate with my friends,” Landes said. “And now that I have a kid, you know, he likes to go to the skate park too. have one in the neighborhood.”
Landes skated as a teenager, he said, and picked up the board again in his 30s.
“I call it as an early-midlife crisis. I took it again. I’m not as risky as I used to be. I try not to get hurt. But yeah, it’s fun. It’s a fun way to clear your mind,” Landes said.
Now, Landes takes his 5-year-old son and daughter to Fire Station Skate Park.
“Skating goes through ups and downs. Right? When I was in high school, it was hot, like Chad Muska was in his prime, everybody loved skateboarding and then he was dead for a decade or something,” Landes said. “And it’s hot again right now. hot. I feel like it’s at a really high point. It’s crazy. Seeing all the different ages at the park.
Landes also highlighted the number of girls skateboarding now, noting that it has grown in popularity and across different demographics. He said the park will definitely attract people to the neighborhood, but it will also bring many people from other neighborhoods.
As for Landes and his children, they will continue to visit the skate plaza.
‘It’s a good place for me to get away and spend time with my son. I do not know. I’m not going to force it on them, but if the community is really strong that way, there’s no reason not to be a part of it.
Cristian ArguetaSoto is the Fort Worth Report’s community-focused reporter. Contact him by email or through Chirping. At Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial backers. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
