A new strategy for public space planning takes the stops off small-wheeled sports.  

By Katharine Logan

There’s no question that skateboarding gets a bad rap. The National Safety Council ranks it safer than baseball—not to mention hockey and football—but it’s perceived as risky. Noise from skate wheels is negligible at 50 feet, but it’s perceived as noisy. And although skaters comprise a wide demographic, they’re stereotyped as teenage boys with a predilection for delinquency.

Misperceptions like these often lead to public spaces that are designed to thwart the sport. In Vancouver, Canada, however, where skateboarding has deep roots, a paradigm-shifting new strategic plan embraces skateboarding as a valid use of the city and is expanding the opportunities to enjoy it.

Developed by van der Zalm + associates for the municipal park board, Vancouver’s CitySkate envisions an interconnected, citywide network of skate amenities. Beyond parks, the 20-year plan, which won a 2023 Canadian Society of Landscape Architects Award of Excellence, aims to integrate small-wheeled sports like skateboarding, scootering, and BMX into the wider fabric of the city’s streets and public spaces. “Our skateparks can’t satisfy the growing number of skateboarders,” says Michelle Larigakis, a planner with the Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation. “In the right place and at the right time, street and city skating is a legitimate form of skateboarding that we encourage.”

Developed during a yearlong process that engaged some 3,300 respondents, CitySkate’s strategies for meeting public demand for small-wheel opportunities envision new and renovated skateparks at both the network and neighborhood scales, including opportunities for DIY installations. In addition to those big moves, skate “dots” and skate “spots” will be developed in existing parks and play areas, as well as in collaboration with the school board’s renovation of school grounds, and as an option for private developers as part of their contribution to public amenities. (The plan defines “dots” as less than 1,600 square feet—maybe just a skateable rail—and “spots” as 1,600 to 6,500 square feet—say, a rail and a couple of ramps, or more.)

“What we learned was it doesn’t have to be a full-blown park,” Larigakis says. “Maybe it’s just a skateable seating ledge next to the basketball courts and playground, so then you get multiple age groups all hanging out together.” The strategy also calls for making greenways more skate-friendly, for example, by integrating dots and spots, improving connections between skate amenities, and providing the smooth surfaces small wheels need.

Travis Martin, a landscape architect with VDZ+A, says the social benefits of skateboarding are legion. For participants, it can improve physical fitness, reduce stress, and build confidence and community. For the public realm, the sport can activate parks, plazas, and underused urban spaces, improving their safety with increased use and offering spectators a great show. “One of the things that excites me most about CitySkate is that it will inject fun into the city,” he says. “It’s started conversations about what our city can be and how we can make better use of the limited space that we have.”

A number of initiatives have already begun. “Having a policy document has really helped us move some projects forward,” Larigakis says. “It’s building momentum, which I don’t think would have been possible without the skateboard strategy.”