After four months of construction, the Camp Washington Skatepark has officially opened.
As part of a grand opening ceremony on Thursday, several city officials and members of the Cincinnati Skatepark Project spoke to a crowd in the middle of the park as riders of every kind — skaters, BMX riders, or those on scooters, quads, blades and more — performed tricks all around them at the new skatepark, located at 1201 Stock Avenue.
“This is an incredible day. This day would not be possible without the community behind it, and I am so proud of this project because it was a community-led initiative,” Mayor Aftab Pureval said at the event. “Let’s give some more praise to the Cincinnati Skatepark Project … this would not have happened without their vision, their activism, their community building and their coalition building.”
Gabrielle Larkin, the co-founder and community engagement director for the Cincinnati Skatepark Project, spoke about how her family’s attempt to create a skatepark in Cincinnati has stretched across multiple generations. Her father has been loudly advocating for a skatepark in Cincinnati for four decades, and her son Silas has attended several Cincinnati City Council meetings to plead the Skatepark Project’s case.
“This park has been a shared dream for far longer than the three years it took to get here … and only just now do we have something to show for it,” Larkin said. “Skating is where I found community. This is the space where my family and the rest of this community will try something new, will fail, will get back up, problem solve, push harder and never quit … Whether you’ve been doing it your whole life or you’re just getting started, this is a space for everyone. This is the first of many for our skate community, for the culture and for Cincinnati. So we just wanted to tell you all, welcome home.”
Leslie Rich, president of the Cincinnati Recreation Commission, said the park was a long time coming.
“I grew up with a bumper sticker on my car that said ‘Skateboarding is not a crime,’ so to be able to vote to support a project like this, I never would have believed it if you told me this was happening when I was 16,” Rich said. “This is an example of what is possible when we’re intentional about meaningful engagement. This is a public space that was created with, by and for the skate community. This will be a regional destination for skaters. It’s going to add more momentum and energy to Camp Washington. And it proves what Jane Jacobs said decades ago: Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.”
Later next month, the park will have another grand opening session on Sept. 26 for riders who couldn’t make it to Thursday’s grand opening. Soon, the team at Cincinnati Skatepark Project plans to add lights so that skaters can enjoy the park after the sun goes down. They’ll also be adding various gardens around the area, among other attractions, so that the area becomes a “community hub that caters to a lot of different people,” Larkin said. In the future, Cincinnati Skatepark Project hopes to open even more skateparks around the city.
“Watching everyone skating right now, it still doesn’t really feel like it’s happening,” she said. “We’ve been working on this so hard and for so long. Every single day, we’ve been talking about different decisions and different ways to push the city and to amplify skaters’ voices. It is totally surreal. It’s a dream come true.”
For more information on the Camp Washington Skatepark, visit the Cincinnati Skatepark Project’s official website.
