Fourth Lethbridge skateboard park planned for west side
LETHBRIDGE – It’s not just the 73-acre Legacy Ridge Park that will have another skateboard park in it, but there is at least one other planned for the west side.
The new Watermark subdivision in west Lethbridge will get one as well, on the grounds of a middle school which is currently under construction.
Sam Richards is the Lethbridge Skateboard Association President, and he confirms the information to Lethbridge News Now.
He says he’s been in design meetings, and it will be slightly smaller than the SLP Skate Park located just off Mayor Magrath Drive.
“The Watermark skate park is not part of the captial budget. It’s part of real-estates development budget. It’s a different department, it’s a different revenue stream. It’s not tax money, it’s based on selling property and making a profitable sub-division, that’s what it’s based on.”
The Watermark (formerly Waterbridge) neighborhood is located south of Copperwood and west of Varsity Village, Mountain Heights and Sunridge. It’s expected to have an extensive parks system, pathways, commercial development and a new middle school.
Richards believes that the plan at this point is to have the Watermark Skate Park built in time for the opening of the new school in the fall of 2018.
He says there could also be another, regional Skateboard Park located in the Crossings area of west Lethbridge at some point.
“That’s going to be the big one, but that one has not been approved, yet.
“But the Watermark one was a surprise to us. All of a sudden, one of our LSA members made mention of an open-house with a skate park, and we’re like ‘what?’ so we were really excited about that. And we went over there to see what’s going on and it was like, ‘oh my goodness, there’s a skate park,’ and it was just a surprise to us, too. So we’re really excited that the City has latched onto that and thinks it’s going to be a benefit to the community.”
Richards believes the city has seen the success of the SLP Park and how much in demand it generally is, explaining that on any given day when it’s not raining or extremely windy, the park is in high demand.
There are currently two skateparks in Lethbridge. A very small one in the far northwest corner of Dave Elton Park in north Lethbridge, and the SLP Park just off Mayor Magrath Drive, in Henderson Park.
Richards isn’t sure what any of the new skateboard parks will be named, but he says what’s happening now in the city is a far cry from what there was here, 20 or 30 years ago.
“I started skateboarding after the movie ‘Back to the Future’ came out. I’ve always enjoyed it…when I was a teenager, I always wanted a skate park. We would build ramps in our yard, but never had that common place where we could go.”
