10400 Detrick Avenue
Kensington, MD 20895
(240) 773-9000 (Phone)
(301) 949-4690 (Fax)
(301) 949-5326 (TTY)
|
||
|
|
10400 Detrick Avenue |
Unofficial skate park ‘K-Town’ concerns residents Neighbors say safety and cleanliness are issues that need to be addressed Some residents who live near Kensington’s unofficial skate park say someone needs to take responsibility for making sure the site is kept safe and clean. But skaters, who call the asphalt lot ‘‘K-Town,” like that the park is unregulated and that they are free to build homemade ramps and jumps. ‘‘You get to decide and control what goes in here. That makes it special,” said 17-year-old James Davis of Glenmont who was skating there on a recent Monday. K-Town is a paved surface in a small park located behind the Montgomery County Department of Housing and Opportunities Commission at 10400 Detrick Ave. Unlike official county skate parks, such as the $750,000 park that opened in Olney in April 2007, the Kensington site is not operated by the county or the town, and therefore doesn’t have rules barring unauthorized ramps and obstacles. For more than a decade, the ramps and rails in K-Town have been built and maintained by the skaters who use the lot. The park features simple boxes and ramps made of wood or concrete. ‘‘You see something on a video and try to build it here,” said Kenny Augustine, 21, of Rockville. ‘‘We’ll build something whenever someone’s got the money to throw down.” But when wood ramps start to rot or can’t be used, they’re pushed to the side and neglected until the skaters remove them or the Montgomery County Department of Housing and Community Affairs are called to throw them away. Neighbors have questioned the safety of the homemade obstacles, but HOC officials said it is not their job to maintain the skateboard equipment. ‘‘The equipment was built by the skaters themselves, which I’m told is a loose and ever-changing group of kids and older people who come to use the facility,” said Susan Yancy, HOC spokeswoman. ‘‘As part of our routine maintenance we’ll cut the grass and pick up the trash but we don’t maintain the equipment.” She said the arrangement has worked out well because HOC is responsible for cutting the grass, but maintenance staff does not have the time to install skateboard equipment. Some residents feel it is time to reopen discussions with the county and neighborhood associations about who should maintain the equipment in the park. Roger Johnson, a resident of the adjacent Kensington Parkwood neighborhood, said that someone should take responsibility for regulating the park. ‘‘If they want a skateboard facility there, put in proper equipment, standard hours and have it cleaned up, ‘‘ he said. ‘‘And if that’s done I don’t think you’re going to see any problems.” In 2005, the Department of Housing and Community Affairs closed the skate park briefly because of unsafe conditions. The county owns the property, but leases it to the HOC, which by default oversees the skateboard park, a small soccer field and a playground on the land. Joe Giloley, chief of the Division of Housing and Code Enforcement for the department, said his staff does not monitor the park but responds to calls. The last time he heard complaints was in 2005 when ramps were reported to be in bad shape and some were nailed to trees. The lot was repaved and some dangerous items removed like the remnants of poles that once supported basketball nets. In 2001, a fence was built to separate the skate park from the adjacent playground after county officials received complaints from residents about safety conditions. Johnson said that it seemed to be a cyclical problem where attention is brought to the park only when neighbors complain about the conditions of the ramps and rails. Neighborhood associations got together in 2005, he said, and wanted to form a committee of skaters and neighbors to take charge of improving the park. That never happened, he said. He feared it would take a serious injury to a skater before the county or the neighborhood associations actively improved the park. Skaters said the equipment they built may not look pretty, but most is safe to skate on. |
|
©2007 Housing Opportunities Commission, All Rights Reserved. Information current as of 6/23/2008. |
 |
