"Why did you allow the commissioner to destroy our skate park?"
Here is a video of me asking NYC Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe a question about the Benjamin Soto skate park on August 9th, 2011 at the Museum of New York City. More about the meeting here.
I guess he didn’t see this video.
Councilman Oddo Threatens To Cut Funds To Parks Department from Group Home Bikes on Vimeo.
Thanks Johanna at parkslope.patch.com
Ben Soto Contest video.
Here is an old good post.
http://www.grouphomebikes.com/2010/01/ben-soto-contest-video/
More random riding photos
This is Sunil and Sebass lookin’ like a couple of homos in front of Slayerville skatepark
I had a real big picture of this on my computer but I accidentally deleted it. Alexis (the photographer of said photo) also had the original but I deleted his shit by accident too.
This is me chillin with Platinum at the trails before her rapid weight loss. Platinum is a marijuana eating weimaraner owned by… you guessed it, Alexis.
This is a photo of my friend Marty back when I was a camper at Woodward in 2005. I always tell people who haven’t gone to Woodward as a camper that the fun is 70% the people you meet and 30% riding. I have met some of the craziest people at Woodward and am lucky to have been able to go.
This is an old ass photo of me doing what looks like is an irish jig mid-air but is actually a downside whip. I tried to go as high as I could on this one and immediately ate shit upon my attempted landing. The fall resulted in me fucking up my hand and not being able to ride for quite some time… something that is becoming more and more frequent. I really love riding but sometimes I wish I didn’t fall so much. This photo was taken by Ben Hittle.
Here’s P.S. 6 local Joe Stazzone doing some kind of skateboard stunt. I’m clueless when it comes to skateboarding but it boggles my mind how people can maneuver a plank of wood so well using only their feet.
Tom Espo took this photo of me at our beloved but now pile of shit skatepark. This photo is the reason I don’t grow my hair out any longer. Perhaps I should have looked in the mirror a little more often.
Another shot at what used to be a good skatepark of Spam, Paino and I. Alexis took this photo.
This is my buddy Dennis Dombrow. I met him at Woodward through my friend Kevin Tierney way back in 2002-2003. Dennis is one of the funniest people I have ever met. He moved from Chicago to Texas and lived with Aaron Ross and Chase Hawk. You can watch him slicing fruit with a samari sword at said house in a somewhat recent Props interview. One time at camp he was wrestling our counselor and nearly snapped his neck. Dennis can now be found fighting people in cages as a professional MMA fighter. You can follow Dennis on twitter @d_liciousD.
This sums up Augie pretty well, wild as fuck. Augie is an extremely talented BMX rider and one hell of a dude. Little known fact: Augie is actually Italian and not Mexican.
This place was heaven on earth for me. These are the legendary South Beach ramps. So much shit has gone down here, so many memories, so many friends and so many good times. I spent every minute I could riding and hanging out at these ramps. I wish I could go back and do it all over again.
New Soto Skate Park: Where's the challenge? say skateboarders and bikers
Soto Skate Park’s new look with no ramps. “This is a slap in the face,” said Stephen Quigley, 17, of Grant City, a constant presence at the skate park for the past four years. “It’s like taking tackle out of football.” (Staten Island Advance/Virginia N. Sherry)STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – MIDLAND BEACH – Young skateboard and BMX enthusiasts who previously flocked to Benjamin Soto Skate Park from all over Staten Island expressed astonishment and disappointment last week about what they see as the dumbed-down version of the borough’s only skate park. The city’s Parks Department reopened the site on June 16.
“This is terrible – there are no ramps – this place is not a skate park any more,” said Woodrow resident Matt Duffy, 14, who attends Tottenville High School and gets from his South Shore home to the Midland Beach facility via the Staten Island Railway (SIR).
Great Kills resident Chris Nazzaro, 17, a recent graduate of Monsignor Farrell High School who will enter the College of Staten Island (CSI) as a freshman, agreed. “I’ll grind the rails for a little, and then find somewhere else to go,” he said.
“The old park was fine – we had a good and decent park – all it needed was repairs,” said Joshua Ocasio, a 20-year-old engineering major at CSI who lives in Prince’s Bay. “They just tore down everything. It should not have been bulldozed. This is crap.”
The Parks Department told the Advance on Monday that “six steel and concrete benches and multiple steel rails planned for the site are now installed,” and “a low concrete platform and ramp will be installed this summer.”
In a statement, the agency explained that “ramps over three feet require safety equipment and helmets and staff to monitor,” adding that “most of the new skate parks being built have primarily ‘street elements.’
“We hope to add concrete ramps, bowls and other elements when we have funding, but we will not be adding ramps over three feet as has been discussed with the community and elected officials on previous occasions,” the agency said.
“This is a slap in the face,” said Stephen Quigley, 17, of Grant City, a constant presence at the skate park for the past four years. “It’s like taking tackle out of football.”
“It’s a disgrace that it’s come down to this, and there’s only this to show,” said a disgusted Tim Cox, 15, of Bulls Head, a BMX enthusiast who attends McKee High School and sometimes rides his bike from the West Shore to Midland Beach when he cannot catch a car ride.
‘NO VARIETY’
From left to right, skateboarders Rich Rojas of Rosebank, 18; Joshua Ocasio of Prince’s Bay, 20; and Akeim Whylie, 16, also of Rosebank. “They should add quarter-pipes, banks, and ramps,” said Rojas, who used Soto Skate Park for four years before it was shut down and demolished.Skateboarders voiced similar complaints last week, all of them upset about the lack of ramps that allowed them to ride, “get air,” and establish momentum for other tricks. “You can’t fly off any of this stuff – there’s no variety,” one of them said.
“I can’t skate transition and do ‘tranny’ tricks. It’s all rails and street stuff,” another complained.
“It’s the worst thing ever. They should take it back, and put in some real edges,” said Akeim Whylie, 16, who lives in Rosebank and attends Ft. Hamilton High School in Brooklyn. “This is like junkyard welding,” he commented, pointing to the low metal rails. “I know because my dad is a welder. I want to unbolt this stuff, and bring it home for my dad to make better.”
His friend Rich Rojas, 18 – a McKee High School student, also from Rosebank – said that the newly reopened park “is not what I was expecting. I’m a little grateful, but they should add quarter-pipes, banks, and ramps.
“They didn’t consult with us when they made this. There should be fewer rails,” added Rojas, a user of the park for the last four years.
The whole point of skate parks is the availability of infrastructure not easily – and legally – found on the streets, the young riders explained.
“Kids go pro at 14 years old,” said Quigley of Grant City. “So for those of us trying to go pro, this is wasted time that we can’t get back. This was a place to learn – the only place on Staten Island.”
WHAT’S NEXT?
“We recognize that the current ‘street elements’ may not accommodate all styles of riding, and we are working with the skateboard and BMX community to identify and advocate for either future enhancements to Ben Soto, or the complete rebuild of a new skate park at the same location,” the Parks Department said in its statement. The agency noted, however, that “there is no budget at this time” to reconstruct Soto Skate Park.
BMX bikers at Soto Skate Park — “This is a slap in the face,” said one.“We are also investigating additional skate park opportunities in Staten Island parks,” the agency added. “We are now considering the possibility of adaptively-reusing the old Safari Amusement Park site (at Arthur Kill Road and Richmond Avenue, owned by the Parks Department) as a skate park,” the agency stated, noting that “a Request for Proposal for the operation of the adjacent building facility as a Parks Concession was released on April 20, and the deadline was June 23.
Read the whole story here
http://www.silive.com/eastshore/index.ssf/2011/06/new_soto_skate_park_no_challen.html
Letter to Adrian Benepe About Ben Soto skate park.
Below is a letter to the Staten Island Advance that I wrote.
In reply to Adrian Benepe’s June 22 letter to the Advance [“Parks Department projects on Island moving forward”]:
I don’t mean to blatantly offend you, but you don’t live on Staten Island, and judging from your actions your eyes and ears must be closed.
First off, you appointed a Parks commissioner who took a $650,000 skate park and put it in the Dumpsters when the skate park could have been repaired for $70,000. Then she issued a press release saying that the Parks is building a “green” skate park. I don’t see what is green about throwing a skate park in the Dumpsters only to build a new one that no one uses now.
On the Cedar Grove opening: Yes, the beach was open and clean, but it’s only clean because the people of Ceder Groove kept it clean for years (not the Parks Department). Give credit where credit is due.
I’m also curious to know the truth about what’s going on with the houses in Cedar Grove. Are there really state intervention issues, or is the movie company still not done with their film yet? Can a public official be honest or do they always have to lie?
Finally, on the mayor’s $70 million indoor track: One of a kind, right?
I have been going to community board meetings, and civic meetings in South Beach and Midland Beach, and I haven’t heard any community requests saying they want the track enlarged. What I have heard is people saying they don’t want the track, and that they want their firehouses to stay open and their schools’ funding to not get cut.
Another important issue that is constantly raised — and one that I think should be put first before sports complexes — is hospital care. We all feel that another hospital is needed on Staten Island.
We want what we have been fighting to protect, not more things that the Parks Department and the city can’t afford. If the Parks Department can’t find money to fix or staff a skate park, how are you going to find money to staff this track? Cut the track and keep the firehouses open, and give us our skate park back.
Here is the link to the letter.
Here is his letter.
By ADRIAN BENEPE
COMMISSIONER NEW YORK CITY
DEPARTMENT OF PARKS & RECREATION
Re: “Parks Disappoints Again,” Advance editorial, Sunday, June 11, 2011:
A recent Advance editorial (“Parks Disappoints Again,” Sunday, June 11th) suggested that Staten Island parks and parks construction projects have suffered from lack of attention.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
Despite dire predictions from some, Cedar Grove beach opened on schedule as promised and is now available for all Staten Islanders to enjoy all summer long. It has municipal lifeguards, beautiful groomed sand, parking, and public toilets.
State intervention temporarily prevents removal of the most derelict bungalows that have no possible public use, but we are doing the due diligence that will allow us to save and re-use those that are sturdy or have architectural merit.
Cedar Grove Beach adjoins New Dorp, which is not a swimming beach and therefore not groomed to be one.
At Ocean Breeze, a $70-million sports facility being built entirely with city capital allocations as part of PlaNYC — the mayor’s long-term plan to make the five boroughs greener and greater — is moving forward with careful oversight and will be a jewel in the crown of sports facilities on Staten Island and for New York for generations to come.
Despite the City’s difficult fiscal situation, the budget for this project was not cut when others were. In response to community requests, the building was enlarged by 35,000 square feet. Seating was increased and lanes were added and widened, with hydraulically banked curves.
Later phases, not yet budgeted, will add in sports fields and other amenities in exchange for these upgrades to the building and main track.
All plans at all stages were made public. Staten Islanders were included at community board meetings in 2009; at presentations to Staten Island elected officials and members of SITRAC in 2010, and at the 2010 groundbreaking ceremony hosted by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, where renderings of the plan stood on easels for all to see.
Parks is working diligently with the city’s Department of Design & Construction at Ocean Breeze, where right now a second engineering firm is evaluating test results and making recommendations as we move forward.
The city will get the project completed as quickly as possible, while making sure the highest standards of construction are adhered to.
And we welcome oversight and inclusion by Staten Islanders and all. With the financial commitment of the mayor and Staten Island’s elected officials, from the borough president to local representatives, we continue to restore existing parks and build new ones.
The hard-working men and women of the Staten Island division of the Parks Department have the Island’s parks once again leading the five boroughs for overall condition and cleanliness.
They are not giving up.
Despite the destruction of their skate park. The Patrons from the Benjamin Soto skate park keep coming to the meetings and seem relentless to get their park back. As you may have seen here in Bupsy’s post. The Parks Department failed horribly trying to build a skate park.
At the meeting on June 22, 2011 the South Beach Civic asked the patrons how they felt about the new skate park the Parks Department installed; their response was straightforward, “it’s too small and it’s boring”.
Great job Parks Department on failing the youth again.
On a good note congratulations to the 8 skate park Patrons who helped out with distributing of the Fire house rally flyers. The 8 of them will be presented a citation at the next meeting.
Here are some photos.
Staten Island Bike riders volunteer to
Staten Island Bike riders volunteer with the South Beach Civic Association and give out flyers and spread awareness of Mayor Bloomberg’s Fire house closings.
They rode around in the back of Chris’s pick up truck.
And here are the photos from the Rally.
Here is a link to the story on SILIVE.
http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2011/06/south_beach_residents_rally_to.html
CB 2 Meeting on 5-17-2011
Here is the Skate park patrons at another Community board meeting fighting for their skate park.
Back to the Beach with NYC Parks Dept Characters
Life seems to be like smoke and mirrors sometimes. Its all a show that eventually ends. It may not be a good one but its something to watch. I am glad I am here right now to see it. Back to the beach was on Wednesday May 25th, 2011.
We decided, we being the Friends of the skate park would go to this event where the NYC Parks Dept Characters come to the beach and cut a yellow ribbon to mark the opening of the beach to the public. But you are not allowed to swim in the water until Saturday May 28th. Why they would have a back to the beach on a Wednesday and not open the beach on the day they cut the ribbon? Its called smoke and mirrors.
So we showed up all wearing shirts that say Where is OUR skate park?
So of coarse we printed extra to give out as you see here almost the whole crowd had one on.
It is also said that one of the Parks Dept staff even took a shirt, maybe because he or she feel that they should have not have demolished it.
Yes your kids are in these peoples hands.
What a nice day to go to the skate park if Staten Island had one.
Ocena Breeze Civic and South Beach Civic always supporting.
Great photo. Timing is everything.
NY1
yup.
Back to the beach 2011 but no one is there.
GHB Store
@grouphomebikes on Instagram
