Robert Carter
CIA 610, Research Paper, SFSU
Spring 2009
In 1964 Shel Silverstein published a book called The Giving Tree about the relationship between a young boy and a tree in a forest. The tree and the boy become best friends. The tree always provides the boy with what he wants: branches to swing from, shade to sit under, apples to snack on, branches to build a house with. Eventually the boy grows older and cuts the tree down to build a sail boat, after many years the boy comes back as an old man and uses the stump of the tree as a quiet place to sit down. As well as being an excellent children's book, The Giving Tree shows how a single object or place's primary purpose can be redefined- what could be considered merely a plant that produced wood for building and fruit for eating is re-defined as a recreational place where the boy can play in the branches or relax in it's shade. Everyone sees things differently; some will look at a tree for its history, some for it's aesthetic qualities, and some for potential as something else. Skateboarders are pioneers in the world of re-defining space for recreation, finding thrills in such mundane objects as curbs, sets of stairs, and empty swimming pools. Skateboarders see things differently than most, while the average person won't likely have a great time with a water drainage ditch or jersey barrier on the freeway, for a skater these things represent infinite possibilities.
No matter what interests a person, that interest will give them a unique perspective on the world. This is a phenomena that has always existed- if someone is interested in architecture will they see a building the same as a “free-walker” or parkour artist. Will a painter see the building the same as a photographer? Now comes the idea of redefining space for recreation; this building, for example, will have it’s structural qualities observed by the architect, it’s aesthetic qualities by the artist etc. but someone interested in recreation can see the building in a different way. One could transform a bare stone wall into a handball court, another person could rappel along the building and practice rock climbing, needless to say- skateboarders would find some recreational use out of the building, and so on. Any space can have infinite potential depending on the person occupying the space. This doesn’t necessarily mean that all places are ideal at any give time. Say for example, a windsurfer looking at the ocean on a calm day is frustrated and can't engage in their sport whereas a regular surfer is thrilled because no wind is optimal for catching waves. Later on in the day, the wind may pick up causing the water to become choppy and hard to surf in, this same wind will give the windsurfer the chance to recreate. Skateboarder’s have traditionally had a less than positive image to the general public, this is largely due to the fact that skating an obstacle will usually impart some wear and tear on the object- whether it be a ledge, planter box, or picnic table. This gives skaters the brand of “vandal” and eventually people begin to think that skateboards and graffiti go hand in hand. If more skate-parks were built and more areas of cities were designated “skateboard friendly” there would be far less skating on personal property therefore a better reflection on skaters in the long run. In San Francisco “it is unlawful to travel upon any sidewalk by means of skateboard” and “damage to surfaces with skateboards is an act of vandalism punishable to the full extent of the law.” (San Francisco Traffic Code Article 5, Section 100; California Penal Code: Section 594)
In a time where skateboarding is now considered a national pastime with nearly as many kids skating as are playing baseball and football, shouldn't there be room for skaters on the sidewalks? Skateboards didn’t exist until the 1950’s, originally thought of as a fad, the skateboard slowly gained popularity and became what it is today. The very first re-definition of space for recreational use with skateboards was to emulate a wave. Skateboarding was born from surfing, “it wasn't until the 1950's, when the surfing craze was in full swing, that people realized skateboarding could recreate the feeling of riding a wave. This connection with surfing gave skateboarding a direction that would influence everything to come, from maneuvers and style, to terrain, fashion and attitude”. (Official Skating Federation) At this time, the concept of gliding over hard surfaces on small wheels was well established, it’s when the space being skated on was redefined into a wave-like surface. Any gradient or slope could be imagined into the sloped shoulder of a wave. Roller skate wheel were attached to pieces of wood, these were then attached to pieces of wood shaped in the form of a small surfboard and “by 1959 the first Roller Derby Skateboard was for sale”. (Official Skating Federation)
In the early 1960's companies such as Larry Stevenson's Makaha and Hobie Alter's Hobie began to mass-produce the first true surfing-inspired skateboards. Some of the early proponents of surf-style skateboarding included Bill and Mark Richards, Dannu Bearer, Bruce Logan and Torger Johnson. Skateboarding became very popular almost overnight, and companies were fighting to keep up with demand. Over fifty million skateboards were sold within a three year period, and the first skateboard contest was held in Hermosa Beach, CA in 1963. Then in 1965 a slew of so-called safety experts pronounced skateboarding unsafe - urging stores not to sell them, and parents not to buy them. The skateboarding fad died as quickly as it had started, and the sport entered its first slump. Skateboarding would experience other slumps in its history. This pattern of peaks and valleys would come to be known as the "ten-year cycle," although the slumps weren't exactly ten years apart.” (Official Skating Federation) In the 1970’s, a drought left thousands and thousands of backyard swimming pools in California empty. Sticking with the skateboard tradition of re-defining a space that the average person has cast aside, skaters began to use the transition of empty pools to simulate steep waves. An empty pool has the perfect transition from flat bottom to vertical wall to be ridden up and down, back and forth, while maintaining speed. **** This discovery of a rideable transition is a milestone in extreme sports and recreation, after skaters found the joys of pool skating, he half-pipe was born. Essentially re-creating the curves of the pool, skateboarders, rollerbladers, and bikers have all pushed the limits of riding in this fashion.
This transition is visible everywhere in nature; rather than being a straight line to connect a flat surface with a vertical surface-which is an angle primarily found in man-made structures, a gradual transition from these two planes is usually found. A tree, for instance, usually doesn’t grow with right angles, the shape of the transition on the base of a large tree trunk is sometimes the exact shape of a quarter circle. 
Taking from this theory, anything that posesseses those same coordinates can be used recreationally by skateboard, bicycle, etc. In surfing and skiing the space lends itself to the sport, in skiing, gravity pulls the rider downhill, it is this speed generated from being pulled downhill is the basis of skiing and what makes it so fun. Storms blow over the ocean and cause waves which travel thousands of miles until they hit a coastline and eventually break, it is a beautiful part of nature that this energy is transformed into a wave that is rideable. An amazing amount of recreation can be had using only this force of nature. A wave hits the shallower coastline after having traveled across deeper water which causes it to rise up vertically, eventually the wave becomes too top-heavy and peels over forward. It is the time when the wave is at that perfectly vertical point, when it possesses the same transition as the empty pool, the tree trunk, and the half-pipe, that it is the most fun to surf and the most speed can be generated. 
As skateboarding evolved and the skill level of riders increased, more and more things were realized to be possible on a skateboard. By turning up the nose and tail of a skateboard, the rider is able to kick down on one end of the board while simultaneously flattening out the board with the other foot so that the inertia generated from this force is enough to keep the board pressed to the rider’s feet. Being able to jump up on obstacles as high as three or four feet made the urban landscape a veritable playground for skaters. Ledges, benches, tables, walls, and every other surface were explored. Spaces which would never be thought of as recreation areas became such. In the 1980’s and 90’s, schoolyards were transformed into skate parks on the weekends. Picnic table, concrete banks, and planter boxes with ledges on the sides we among the many obstacles found at nearly every elementary, middle, and high school. “Street Skating” as this would be called, is far different in space redefinition than pool skating. With pools and the earlier styles of skating, the riders were imagining a wavescape that they were surfing over rather than concrete, trying to emulate surfing maneuvers. Over time, skating has come into its own and the average rider is no longer trying to re-create surfing maneuvers, there are far more tricks possible on a skateboard starting from the most basic and stretching infinitely out as far as one’s skill level will take them. The idea of redefining space, however, did not change. According to Ocean Howell, “the type of street skating that was practiced in the suburban parking lot was, by and large, limited to curbs and sidewalks” this is not as noticeable as “the type that constantly damages planters, handrails, fountains, and anything else that is found in a city street” this style of skating “was born in the Golden Gateway, and the Bunker Hill Redevelopment area in Los Angeles (where the first handrail was skated by Mark Gonzales, one of the inventors of street skating). Were it not for these redevelopment projects, it is possible that skateboarding would have never mutated past its more benign form—destroying only curbs, which cities and corporations were not particularly concerned about.” (Howell, Redevelopment and the Fruits of Xenophobia) It was not until skater’s had the nerve and skill to use this cityscape as a playground that skater’s truly began to be branded as vandals and menaces to society.
It is impossible to discuss the evolution of skateboarding without mentioning the EMB or the Embarcadero in San Francisco, specifically in the 1990’s. It was here that a new generation of skaters re-defined how street architecture could be used. Justin Herman Plaza at the end of Market St. on Embarcadero St. was chock full of concrete obstacles: stairs, curbs, ledges, ledges down stair sets, a concrete “wave” that curled up, and a concrete stage around the fountain. James Kelch, Mike Carrol, Jovantae Turner, and Henry Sanchez were some of the best known skaters of the time that localized the EMB. These skaters would invent tricks and new ways to ride their skateboards. This was certainly not the first crew of skaters to spend extended periods of time at one urban spot, but they were notorious. Skateboarding is by nature a rebellious sport, oftentimes including jumping fences, running from the police, and bending the laws of “destruction of property.” In the 1990’s at Justin Herman Plaza, the average bystander would be confused by the skateboarding: the loud sounds of wheels on brick, the excitement of the skaters. One person may want to sit down on a bench that a skater is using as an obstacle, in this case there is an argument of whose property the bench is. Unfortunately, the person wanting to sit down on the bench always wins, this argument happened enough times to prompt city officials to put “skate-stoppers” on every rideable edge in San Francisco. According to Skate Stoppers Co., a company that manufactures and sells these anti-skateboard devices, “each year millions of skateboarders, roller bladers, and bikers take to the streets in search of the best places to skate and ride. Even with the rapid growth of skate park facilities nationally, your property has become a practice ground for disruptive and destructive activity.” Skate Stopper’s mission statement on their website goes on to say “what is deemed by skaters and bikers as "creative expression" is costing you money. In their aftermath, they leave black stained, broken, and worn concrete (and you're lucky if that is all). You are left facing the daunting task of clean-up, repair and replacement.”
(SkateStoppers.com) Obviously there are two sides to the story, University of New Mexico has a policy on campus that prohibits skateboarders from “performing acrobatic maneuvers, stunts, trick riding or any similar movements. Excessive speed, skating within 15 feet of a building and ‘jumping on or over steps, benches, rails, walls, fountains or other permanent or temporary fixtures’.” These rules are in place for the safety of pedestrians, but many students at UNM feel that “it looks worse than it did with just the missing paint” and would rather have their rails and benches free of metal knobs. (UNM Daily Lobo, 3/03)Architecture is an artform, and architects take pride in their work. In the 1980’s, artist Richard Serra built one of the “most controversial works of public art of the 20th century, a curved wall of steel entitled Tilted Arc . It stood, 12 feet high and 120 feet long, in Federal Plaza in Manhattan for just eight years, while local opposition reached such a pitch that, after a combative public hearing in 1985, a jury voted that the piece should be dismantled and removed.” Richard Serra “sued the federal government over the issue of ownership but, after a protracted and bitter court battle, lost his appeal. In May 1989 the piece was cut into three parts and consigned to a New York warehouse where it has languished ever since.” (Guardian, UK) Serra’s piece redefined the Federal Plaza, he transformed the space into something completely different that was hated by the public. Tilted Arc was taken down because people weren’t comfortable having this space split, they felt disconnected from the people on the other side of the wall.
Architecture, whether built in an artistic way or not, has all been re-evaluated since the birth of street skating. From the oldest structures in Europe to the sleekest most modern buildings in metropolis’s around the world, skaters are able to ride nearly anything. This sparks the question: “Is it worth battling the overwhelming desire that millions of skateboarders have to utilize the city streets in a recreational way, or is it better to attempt to dissuade skaters from riding virtually everything? An example of an artist creating something skateable is the AP Gianini Plaza at the Bank of America building in downtown San Francisco. Ocean Howell writes that “it is an enormously unpopular corporate space, famous among urbanists for its disregard for sunlight and for being generally inhospitable.” At the edge of the Plaza is a sculpture by the Japanese artist Masayuki Nagare. It is a large, black, heart-shaped sculpture that is named "Transcendence." Howell writes that “from the street level perspective, the perspective of people's everyday lives, this sculpture is didactic and pretentious; San Franciscans have always disdainfully referred to it as the "Banker's Heart." Skaters see nothing so high-minded as 'transcendence' in this object; instead they see an opportunity to celebrate the messy vitality of the street, a chance to reaffirm the chaotic daily life that this object seeks to transcend. This space as a whole instructs its users to briefly observe this sculpture commemorating the rejection of street life, and move along. But when Ken Kay gave the plaza a makeover in 1996, he obstructed the approach to the sculpture with what he called a Japanese Garden.” (Howell, Voyeur-god vs. the Spatial Practitioner) This garden covered the concrete between the sidewalk and the sculpture making the sculpture impossible to skate. “Once again the Banker's Heart was condemned to be almost universally unappreciated by the public.” (Howell, Voyeur-god vs. the Spatial Practitioner)
This space went from being an uninviting corner of the Financial District to a sculpture that was appreciated for it’s aesthetic quality and also for it’s recreational purpose. Skateboarder’s transformed a mundane object into a surface in which to express themselves in a beautiful way. Once again, the average passerby was scared by this and the owners of the bank and city officials were concerned about liability issues so the space became disliked by all, much like the rails and benches at University of New Mexico.Fort Miley in San Francisco, located near the Sutro Baths, was built in 1899 as part of America’s early involvement with World War II. It was equipped with rapid fire guns in the 1940’s and was one of San Francisco’s main defense stations after Pearl Harbor was attacked. These concrete bunkers lair dormant in San Francisco for over 40 years until skateboarder’s found a new use for them. Instead of being used to fight a war and defend a county, these very same objects were given a new purpose as skateboard ramps and banks to ride on.
Once again, city officials in San Francisco found out about this and have since been doing there best to keep skaters away. I’ve personally had more than a few conversations with Park Rangers as they expel me, their reasons usually include: “There’s a good chance you kids are up here spray painting, the two go hand in hand”; “war veterans come here to look at where they once fought and see the bunkers’ edges marred up”; and my very favorite- “you kids come out here and make videos of yourselves skating here and put them on youtube then skaters from Japan see the videos and come out and skate here.” It is an argument that will most likely continue with neither party satisfied, there are pros and cons to re-appropriating space for recreational use. A compromise between city officials and skateboarders has came in the form of DIY. A “do it yourself” mentality is what separates skaters from nearly any other sport. When no skateparks are built in the area and skateboarding is illegalized on city streets, the only option is to build oneself a skatepark. This is what happened at Burnside in Portland, Oregon and later on at Washington Street in San Diego, FDR in Philadelphia, and Channel St. in San Pedro. In 1990 a group of skateboarders found themselves living in Portland with some extra bags of concrete left over from a project that fell through. Staying dry is one of the biggest challenges of skating in Portland, these skaters noticed that the space underneath the Burnside Bridge stayed fairly dry through the rain and decided to pour some concrete into something skateable under the bridge. More and more skaters began helping out with this project and eventually the first and most famous DIY skate spot was born. Skateboarder’s took the city’s refuse and turned it into a thriving pocket of culture and recreation. Before this project, the space under the Burnside Bridge “was nasty as in old syringes, dirty mattresses, crapped in clothes, thick dust on the wall, and sketchy people wandering around. It was also someplace you didn't want to be caught alone at night. The crime rate in the area was very high due to the fact that the area was basically a no-mans land with empty lots and easy access to the passing freight trains.” (weekend warrior 2004) after completetion, the space had been transformed into a totally different kind of area that was a positive thing for the city and the community rather than a bad thing. Burnside skatepark has existed in Portland for almost 20 years, this DIY mentality has sparked a concrete revolution in which skateboarders have stopped limiting themselves to what is already in front of them and have begun making their own space.
In 1999 skateboarders in San Diego were having more and more trouble finding good places to skate “an executive decision was made to create a task-force to deal with the issue of skateboarders and skateboarding in the City of San Diego. Officers of the ‘Peace’ were paid double-time plus commission to work extra hours with the sole mission of ticketing and incarcerating skateboarders.” (WSSA 2008) Similar to the group of men who created Burnside, a place underneath a freeway overpass was selected and large amounts of concrete were poured. “Once the city realizes a skateboard park is being built on their property without their permission they are incensed and immediately decide to tear it down. Bulldozers are moved in but the skaters are unyielding and will not stop skating. At the same time mass media is brought in to expose the story. The skaters create enough public support that the city will hear their story. But the park is surrounded with K-Rails to render the spot un-skateable.” For a city to say to somewhere is “ok” to skate requires them facing the possibility of injuries occurring there which brings up liability issues. In order for Washington St. Skatepark to remain intact many city council meetings were had and finally the city decided that if the skaters could collect “a non-profit organization to administer the park, land use permits, encroachment and removal permits, construction insurance, and most importantly the one and only Engineering Permit (a $2400 piece of documentation) that allows construction to begin” they would be allowed to keep their park. Washington St. is now the top rated skate park in Southern California and has received many awards, just like Burnside, Washinton St. is preserving its own legacy and will always be remembered. Ideally future generations will see the pro-active thinking that skater’s have employed to make projects like this happen: if the city won’t build a park “Do it Yourself”. Thrasher Magazine coined the term “Skate and Destroy” which has been branded on T-shirts, tattooed on arms, and spray painted at skate-spots for decades. Rather than to “Skate and Destroy,” the new aim of some skaters is to “Skate and Create.”
I recently spent time with Jeff King who stars in "Built to Shred" a TV show about spot-modification on Fuel TV. In the time I spent with Jeff I saw him transform junk metal into skate-obstacles, pouring concrete to permanently change a space, he even brought in snow blowers to turn his Southern California home into a ski resort complete with jumps off of the roof. Jeff King seems to have no limits in what he can create, it is inspiring to watch someone work in such a free manner. One day I was at the Washington St. Skate Park with King while he was installing a new skate obstacle. Rather than finding a new piece of steel for this curved rail, Jeff found old junk-metal with a mermaid-motif and transformed that into an obstacle. Whether he realized it or not at the moment, Jeff King was installing an art piece that worked on many levels. Simply taking this scrap metal and physically bending it into a different shape is worthy of a gallery, but to add in the physical recreational aspect of it makes it into a more amazing piece of art.
(the art-rail Jeff King installed)
Jeff King is a unique artist who has been blessed with a great outlet for his creativity, having the funding of a television show; he has the means to see his wildest ideas come to fruition.
Through the decades skateboarding has had the image of novelty toy like the hula-hoop, an alternative to surfing, and a great show of athelticism. Eventually skaters began to be associated with vandals and troublemakers, making them outcasts of society. All this time skateboarding has endured, and now it has come full circle. Space is relative to how it is being used, and the world is starting to notice that skaters are good at re-appropriating space and turning it into something with recreational value. Many meeting have been had between the San Francisco Skateboard Association and the city of San Francisco about the first “skate plaza” in SF. Near the corner of Duboce and Mission, there is an alleyway under the bride that was initially thought of as a parking lot but has not been serving any purpose. Bryan Hornbeck, member of the S.F.S.A, says that “it's going to be a million-dollar world class skate park," located in this “airspace” or unusable space (as deemed by CalTrans) (SFSA, 2009) When we think of the pros and cons of “destroying” areas by skateboarding like the military bunkers at Fort Miley or the concrete ledges at the University of New Mexico, and how there is no “correct” answer to the problem, we can see that in the end skateboarders have won. Instead of banning skaters from every schoolyard, every sidewalk and driveway, and every other nook of concrete that is available, cities are forced to consider the option of building skate-plazas. An area in the city that has legalized skateboarding and has built a series of obstacles similar to what one would find in the city streets. Artificial concrete banks, ledges, planter boxes, handrails, even artificial fire hydrants and concrete trash cans may be implemented as obstacles. Rather than waxing up the planter box in front of someone’s house and grinding it, potentially starting an argument with the homeowner, skateboarders will now have the option to recreate in peace without worrying about police, pedestrians, or angry citizens. Rob Dyrdek, star of MTV’s show “Fantasy Factory” spearheaded one of the first true skate-plazas in Los Angeles, what Dyrdek refers to as a “safe spot skate spot” in Lafayette Park adds layers onto the possibilities of that space. Rather than taking the scenic LaFayette Park and filling it with ugly concrete, Dyrdek succeeded in adding to the beauty and creating an art piece that is functional and aesthetically pleasing at the same time. Like “The Giving Tree”, a park or freeway underpass can serve more than one purpose. With the tree the boy used the branches to swing from, shade to sit under, apples to snack on, branches to build a house with etc. With a pro-active mindset we can transform any space into something that serves an alternate purpose; whether it be for skateboarding, for art, or anything else, we can layer the world with as many ideas as we can imagine.
In conclusion, the artistic connection between transforming space and skateboarding is an area that will continue to be explored. From its roots as re-appropriating empty swimming pools and hill as skate parks, to the point where skateboarding was nearly banned so leftover space was physically transformed by skaters. And finally to the present, where skateboarding is more readily accepted to the point where architecture can include “skate-friendly” surfaces. To change a space into something that can provide unlimited recreational possibilities is the ultimate form of changing one man’s trash into another man’s treasure.
References
http://sfist.com/2009/01/23/skateboarders_beware.php
http://www.skatelog.com/skateboarding/skateboarding-history.htm
http://bss.sfsu.edu/urbanaction/ua2001/ps4.html
http://media.www.dailylobo.com/media/storage/paper344/news/2003/03/14/News/Skate.Stopper-392929.shtml
http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2008/oct/05/serra.art
http://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/wwIIbayarea/mil.htm
http://www.burnsideproject.blogspot.com/
http://www.washingtonstreetskateboardpark.org/history.php
http://sfskateboarding.org/11.html
Thrasher, 25 Years of Skateboarding Copyright High Speed Productions, 2007
Thrasher, Epic Spots, The Places You have to skate before you die, High Speed Productions, 2008
San Francisco Department of City Planning. (1971). Urban Design Plan for San Francisco.
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