“Cycling/Skateboarding Area in District Open Space at Area 9 ”
Another excellent example of how Hong Kong Tax payers $$ is being wasted….
In the last couple of years of my involvement with the design & building of skateparks with the Hong Kong Government, I realized the following:
1- They don’t really care what they are building; as long as the ‘end users’ are happy with it - ‘end users’ in this case are representatives from the skateboard community & BMX association ( if it really exists in HK )
2- As long as what they build conform to “Safety” & Building standards that applies to ‘recreational parks” or “play grounds”, (which means nothing can be over 1M high) This is totally contradictory to what is needed in a skate park
3- It seems like the govt always go for the lowest bid builder.
4- The lowest bid builder always pushes & sells modular park systems that have been proven by countless skaters around the world to functionless & a waste of $$, just google “kubler skateparks” & see.
5- The govt always wants to make everyone happy, even though they are ultra rigid on the above rules. So they end up building the features we want, in a scaled down version of the park. They involve people that have totally no experience whatsoever in skateparks or Skateboarding or BMX for that matter:- from the so called “BMX experts” ( the guys responsible for the Fucked up Fanling park in Hong Kong) to the Architects that draw & designed this park, they seem to think that its okay to design something just by getting the input from the end users & experts.
Obviously, they have some kind of budget as well, so when we asked for a bowl, & they gave us some sort of formation using modular parts, wasting 1/4 of the park on the side & the middle parts are totally wasted. Not like its cheap, either. Go to www.kubler.com & see how much those modular parts cost. Thats not counting the shipping. YES, they gonna ship concrete parts all the way from Europe to Hong Kong. How FUCKED is that?
You really have to be a skater/rider to “SEE” the lines & how the place should be built. I can go on & on & on about this.
Please support & go to my forum at HKskateboarding.com & leave a comment
See this forum thread.