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skate cal-trans

rak1os

I have noticed that since cal-trans construction finished, skateboarders have been using those big grey, monolithic, angular pieces that face 1st street as bank ramps....or wall ride surfaces.

I think that it is funny how architects design the perfect forms for skaters to rip on and they are never the wiser.
Then after a few months of people skating on their building, marking up the walls with wheel dirt and grease, they have to provide some sort of a shitty fix to keep the skaters out.

I'm sure you have all seen the small metal brackets that they have to fix to curbs, planter boxes, and hand rails.

What are some other buildings or places that were not designed for skating but still get a pack of kids grinding up their curbs every afternoon? and what innovative possible "fixes" have you seen?

PS. caltrans had a few maintenence people out there with srcubber brushes and soap trying to clean off the wheel marks, and they only made it look worse....haha




 
Dec 20, 04 6:46 pm
e

stanley saitowitz did band of conrete benches along the embarcadro. they are beat to shit now. all the edges and corners are chipped off.

Dec 20, 04 7:49 pm  · 
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slaprabbit

yeah thats what happens when u design benches, stairs, and etc.
i used to skate, skated all turing my high school and slowly stop..
i still skate only for transportation use, and to excersice.
i used to skate at bunker hill, school. and stairs.

yeah alot of great places to skate, i never really thought of what architects thouhgt of it, as a positive, not that their is a positive side to it all, plus its california where skateboarding originated. so i dont think its a big deal, i pretty sure every saturday or sunday in LA. you see a group of adolescences going down the hill or skateing on the side walk. nothing really stops them from skateboarding..
my idea is make broken peicies or small legdes that are high..

well since i am free all weekend i m gana take a look at CAL trans
i was their a week before they opened it. i was asked to leave. really intresting. building. i hvnt been inside.

Dec 20, 04 10:55 pm  · 
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funny about saitowitz. he should know better. he designed a building for louisville that was MEANT to be skated on. (too bad we haven't built it.)

Dec 21, 04 9:34 am  · 
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SV

As long as nobody gets run over I think it makes the building more interesting. People should realize skaters are around by now, so maybe if it wasn't built to be skated, and it is skateable, it was poorly designed.

Dec 22, 04 6:06 am  · 
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glick

Zaha's CAC in Cincinnati is essentially a 1/4" pipe made of concrete. Very nice proportions for bikes and skaters...they ended up putting a cluster of concrete "stools" right at the base of the radius. Even if the skater found a way over them on the approach...they would meet them very quickly on the way back down...I would say pretty effective in that regard.

Dec 22, 04 8:16 am  · 
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glick

I meant 1/4 pipe...not 1/4"...that would be hard to skate on...oops

Dec 22, 04 8:17 am  · 
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