Sound of the Suburbs

Not completely out of touch with what the Members sang about, but in this case it’s the “Ka-chunk. Ka-chunk” sound of wheels rolling over the metal plates of prefab ramps in suburban Chicago. I skated my former hometown’s Centennial Park Skate Facility in Naperville Illinois. It’s about 4 years old and prefab, so I was expecting the worst. The surface was in surprisingly good shape given the weather extremes in the Chicago area, have I been mislead about the evils of prefab? No, it turns out they are replacing the surface annually, according to one local. So much for saving money by going prefab.

Admittedly, I’m only spending so much time on this park because it happens to be where I’m stuck at for the next few days. It’s completely unremarkable except for the fact that the city seems to be maintaining it well. The locals are completely happy with what they have, and don’t seem to know any better. In fact, the annual Skate Picnic is coming up, which features a doughnut eating contest between skaters and police officers. The event is supposed to foster good will and open communications between police officers and skating teens. I really mean “teens” because I was the oldest guy there by about 20 years. I’m used to showing up at a park and finding at least one guy nearing 30.

This little guy was standing guard near the entrance to the park. He’s got the classic bent wrist basketball swish style hand posture, a board from late ’79, and some kind of contraption on his head.

A closer look reveals that it appears to be a cut off sleeve or sweat pant leg with a string tied around the top. How odd.

Here’s some ledge action as you enter the park.

Here’s a panorama of the main area.

This flat ramp seemd to be the designated “hangout” area, good for lounging and watching your friends practice their flyouts on the opposite side.

This is the miniramp which they have the gall to call a halfpipe. It’s mostly used the same way halfpipes are used in most prefab parks. Which is to say, it’s mostly for practicing kickflip variations off of the four inch drop from the flat to the cement. I was riding it and some kids were standing on the flat. I told them to get off the miniramp, to which they snottily replied “This is a halfpipe!” OK, whatever you want to call it, just get off the damn flat!

I guess those kids are right. If you look at the official layout of the park, it most definitely says halfpipe.

Want some action? How about this rolleblader launching off the spine ramp and over the fence? He did it about six times.

I actually managed to have a little fun here. I worked on a few lines and took a nice slam on the miniramp, excuse me, halfpipe. It’s a nice little one except for the fact that the hubba ledge from the adjacent ramp butts up against the back of the coping. So what you get is an extension that is recessed from the coping just slightly farther back than the width of the coping. I managed to get into an axle stall on the extension, but it will take a far more gnar skater than me to try and drop back in from that. Also, I wouldn’t go out of my way to ride this park if it weren’t litterally five minutes away from my mom’s house.

Later tonight I am checking out the other allegedly concrete park.