It’s a huge boost for the skateboarding community in Niagara County.
On Saturday, officials announced grant funds are headed towards building a new concrete skate park at the Railyard Skatepark in Lockport.
“Lockport is one of two locally that has been happy enough to receive a $300,000 grant,” said Dr. John Craig, the chairman of Lockport Community Services.
The grants are part of the Built to Play Skatepark program created through a partnership between the Tony Hawk Foundation and the Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Foundation. The program will match up to $250,000 in funds and provide an additional $50,000 to help with design features that would lessen the park’s environmental impact.
“It’ll be a lot better than the one we currently have so you could do a lot more cool tricks, get some kick flips in,” said Joshua Richter, a Lockport resident who’s been skateboarding for 20 years.
The current park was built over a decade ago to provide skateboarders with a safe place to have fun. But now there are safety and deterioration concerns surrounding the wooden park.
“This new skate park will be a concrete poured in place structure, it’s going to be permanent. It’ll last dozens of years, it’ll require very low maintenance over the years,” said Trevor Staples, the manager of the Built to Play Skatepark program.
“It’s going to be nothing like any other park around here, it’s going to be unique. We’re going to have a bunch of more features that these other parks don’t have and we’re also going to put in some extra perks in there to kind of get people to go the park and enjoy it,” said Vince Wiese, one of the co-founders of the Friends of the Railyard Skatepark, an organization formed in 2018 to support the recreational skating community in Lockport.
With the grants approved, now comes the hard part which is raising the matching funds for the project. But with an already invested interest from the community in Lockport, people are hopeful.
“I’m overwhelmed with joy,” said Richter.
The new park is slated to open in 2021.