Bradenton Florida by Team Pain

Bradenton, Florida has a relatively new Team Pain skatepark on the riverwalk. It’s mostly waist high or under, with the exception of a 10ft or so vert wall on one end of the park and a large bowl on the opposite. The park is long and narrow, dissected in the middle by an overhead highway bridge that crosses the river. As with Louisville, KY, it’s more or less across the street from the hospital. I’m not sure if they do that on purpose or not. It’s on a stretch of land that would otherwise most likely be vacant, which means plenty of room for expansion! The non-skating locals I spoke with are very pleased with it, and consider it a destination worth hanging out at just to watch and enjoy the location. More photos and a video skate through after the jump.

This is a nice collection of benches with different heights, angles and materials, it even brought out the long hibernating (dormant, retired?) street skater in me.

A couple shots of this really nice bowl. They build them different in Florida by comparison to your typical Northwest build that tends to incorporate more of the flat into the same pour as the transition. Not a critique, just an observation. This bowl is kind of hidden at the end, (See top of photo above)  raised up a bit to accommodate a higher water table. If you didn’t know it was there you might not notice it, but it’s quite large actually. I’d say the deep is around 10 foot. Tile on a bowl is always a nice touch.

The big vertical wall at the end may seem a little arbitrarily out of place, but it  shields a maintenance shed behind.

These photos were all taken at mid day, so the lighting is harsh and surface irregularities are artificially exaggerated. It’s smooth as you’d expect from Team Pain.

Some of the local talent.

Shaky skate-through of the park. I need a steadicam rig for my iPhone. Yes, there is a healthy scooter population.

Bradenton is a fun park and the locals are friendly. Check it out if you’re near the Sarasota/Tampa area.