From Surfin’ Turf to Bell E. Buttons, to The Turf, to buried, to resurrected and buried again, to dug up and re-poured. The Turf is now open again! This areal shot is from drone footage circulated by the Mayor of Greenfield Wisconsin, Michael Neitzke, who was instrumental in making this momentous occasion move from just a dream to a reality. Midwesterners of the 80’s and skaters of today, rejoice!

It was way back in 2009 that rumors were floating around about a possible rebirth of the Turf when the current tenants were allegedly not going to renew their lease. That turned out to be false, or so we thought. Then it turned out to be sort of true again, in that they had obviously vacated the property during the freeway ramp construction, which led to the temporary excavation in 2010. The locals didn’t give up! In 2019 it was announced that WDOT sold the land to the city of Greenfield for one dollar. The plan was to turn it into a new (old) skatepark, the old bowls would be brought back to life and new terrain would be added outside the existing footprint. Why can’t I find an internal S&A link to that story? We must have been on hiatus… Great news right? Would they do it? Yes! I had always been skeptical about the ability to just patch up the old bowls and add some new coping, and apparently I was right. They ended up scrapping that plan and instead took “detailed 3 D sonar” scans of the bowls that would allow them to excavate and rebuild as…

The Milwaukee Journal has an article on a documentary in progress about the Turf (AKA Surf N’Turf) skatepark. Much like the Nude Bowl, the Turf just won’t die, and keeps coming back decades after you thought it was gone forever. Opened in late 70’s then shut down and turned into a strip club, then reopened in the 80’s, then shut down again, raised and burried. Then dug up and skated briefly! Then filled in again amidst a community effort to have it saved. It seemed like a pipe dream, but somehow the City of Greenfield ended up buying the land from the department of transportation to save it from becoming offramp. Now, not only will it be dug up and refurbished as it existed, indoors in it’s heyday, it will also be surrounded by a new, modern and public skatepark outside. Stoked to be able to add this to our coverage of The Turf, and anxiously awaiting the premier of “Believe It.” [Photos: L-City of Greenfield. R- Peter DiAntoni]

Let’s see… cleaning out the old inbox here. What’s this? The Sturgeon Bay Skatepark Initiative has met their finding goal and hopes to break ground on a new Grindline park in June. I wonder how that’s coming along… It’s finished? That was fast. Wait, what’s the date on that email? 2014. OK , well, that makes sense. Hold on, now they’re saying it was built by Dreamland. Maybe Wisconsin has the same wacky law that Washington has. Whatever, looks fun. Did you know Wisconsin ranks 6th out of all the states in beer consumption? I would have thought that the state with The Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous would have ranked higher than Vermont. Sturgeon are kind of gnarly.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin locals who aren’t content to wait for the Turf to be dug up again or settle for facilities like the one you see above (no joke!) have taken things into their own hands. RideMKE is a non-profit organization committed to establishing sustainable concrete parks in Milwaukee. (MKE is the airport code for Milwaukee’s Mitchell International Airport.) The first item on the agenda is to clean up and improve the abortion that is Estabrook park, but the ultimate goal is to spread concrete to new locations. The county is on board because it isn’t costing them anything. Check the story out on OnMilwaukee.com, or stop by RideMKE blog or Facebook page.

My old friend Evil Tom sent me this link which he subtitled “Why adults should not portray teenagers in their art.” “Fledgling” – All of us feel, or have felt, the awful and wonderful growth of this pre-teen skateboarder. Small wings on his back, he wants to fly yet is not ready to soar. Is he slouching to defy, to define himself, or to bear the weight of wings getting larger every day? Installed in downtown La Crosse, Wisconsin, this life size standing bronze figure reminds us young citizens need community support. Well, at least his heart is in the right place, although I’m worried about his heart on. I’m bummed out at our Wisconsin readers. This tip came from a guy living in Michigan!

The Turf may be filled in, but the momentum is not dead. The same station that covered the digging out effort aired an editorial (Ted’s Take) coming down on WDOT bureaucracy. There’s an official web site for the voce of saving the Turf, appropriately named Save the Turf. The Mayor of Greenfield, (It’s technically not Milwaukee, I always forget that.) seems to be cautiously in the corner of the effort. Wisconsin’s DOT seems to be passing the buck. Their stance is that they need the land as a staging area until the off ramp is finished, at which point the land is scheduled to be given to the city of Greenfield. So theoretically, if they cover it with enough rubble so it doesn’t get further damaged, when the project is over they could dig it out again and repair it. Ted’s Take after the jump, or head on over to Save the Turf.

Guess what? It’s Turf week on Skate and Annoy. All Turf, all the time. We have a campaign going to help save Surfin’ Turf/ The Turf skatepark here in Milwaukee, WI. We even went so far as to dig out one of the bowls last night and made it on the 10:00 news. Details about whats going on, a video of the news story, and most importantly what people can do to help save the park are all at beercity.com. More information and the video after the jump. UPDATE: It’s been filled in. I don’t know how this effects the big picture.

Martin Defatte sent in some more pictures from the digging effort at the Turf. These were actually from late Wednesday, but I couldn’t get to processing them until now. Martin said the cops showed up that evening which put a damper on things, but the bright side is, there’s all kinds of positive publicity now, and what could have been just an epic session for a bunch of hard working guys may possibly evolve into a more permanent solution. Please contact the wisco DOT, as they are currently in charge… Here is the phone #: (608) 266-1114 Here is the email: Frank.Busalacchi@dot.wi.gov Take 5 minutes and shoot them a friendly email, note the historical significance as well as the potential tourism dollars. We need your help! I may have left the Midwest for the land of amazing skateparks, it’s my home now with a capital “H” but right now my heart is in WIsconsin. Thanks again to Martin.

Seeing this made me wish I could afford to take the rest of the week off and fly back to be a part of this. Josh Ellis has a bunch of photos up on Wiskate.com that are going to give you a warm fuzzy. So it’s the Shot of the Week here on Skate and Annoy, but all the action is in Wisconsin. Beer City has another installment too.