Balboa Skatepark

I liked it. It’s an amazing place to skate and meet people. It’s nice that the skatepark is wooden. You have to be there early though before a lot of the children come. Overall still a good skatepark.

This’ quite the perfect small park, with a little bit of everything. Tight squeeze for some things but all in all a great park!
I commute on bike and board to and from the bart station and having this park here makes a great warm up for the day and a nice finish to the day (if there’s still sunlight).

This park is all wood, but the bowl and pyramid are the best parts. They have a 3 flat 3 with a hand rail and a hubba on the left side. Lots of locals and super packed on the weekends. I usually go on mondays and tuesdays and there’s only the older locals who skate in between classes. I have met quite a few really cool dudes, you don’t get that «locals only» vibe. Everyone is chill and nice. Only downside is that there’s no flat bar. Give us a damn flat bar in the city!!!

Fun, relatively new, wooden park.
The lil mini bowl is hella fun, and the pyramid is perfect.
There’s nowhere to eat in the area, but the close proximity to the BART makes up for it. I would suggest hitting it up during school hours. Probably no fun when crowded.

Saturday was the grand opening celebration for this new skatepark, on the south corner of Balboa Park, and facing the northern side of Balboa BART station. It’s been open to the public for awhile.
The entire renovation of Balboa Park is really beautiful.
Some people have the misconception that skate board parks attract the wrong type of crowd. Skate boarders are not biker gangs, just regular kids. Also, it’s safer to have an enclosed space for kids to practice new skating skills, instead of them grinding the sidewalks and damaging handrails on public streets.
I hope that vandals don’t start tagging this park the way they did Potrero del Sol Skatepark. That other place is all made of concrete, so the graffiti can be painted over or sandblasted. This new skatepark’s bowl and ramps are made of wood, so any graffiti would ruin it, and be more costly to fix (replace).
But I also wonder how long the wood surfaces will last after a few rainy seasons.
Here’s a cool video of people skating on opening day:
Similar future city projects in progress:
— Duboce Street Skatepark (aka. Central Freeway skatepark)
— Waller Street Skatepark (in the Haight Ashbury district)