Three granite benches spent a weekend under the Cambie Bridge recently, giving skateboarders a chance to grind out of the rain while raising the ire of others.
Now the benches are gone, removed by the same people who put them there before the city could haul them away.
The city and the Vancouver Skateboard Coalition (VSC) held a pop-up event under the bridge on Saturday, Oct. 23. As part of the event, the VSC set up three granite benches along with some wooden obstacles, says VSC vice-president Michelle Pezel. The event drew many from Vancouver's skateboarding community, acting as a way to engage people with the survey being run right now to come up with a long-term plan.
Pezel says the VSC opted to leave the benches in place as an experiment to see how long they would last. "That didn't work that well."
While Pezel didn't hear any complaints from neighbours, the Vancouver Biennale complained, as the underside of the bridge is being used for its Voxel Bridge installment. By the following Monday, Pezel was uncertain the benches would be allowed to stay much longer and called a crane truck to move them back into storage.
"We took them out on our own because we were worried about them," she explains.
The under-the-bridge experiment was a part of the VSC's long search for a covered area where the City of Vancouver would allow skateboarding.
Now, with benches once again in storage, the search for a space continues.
The area under the Cambie Bridge has been used for 20 years but in an unofficial capacity. Pezel says the VSC could easily see that area being sanctioned, with a skate path going in next to the walkway. "It wouldn't be wild to put a little strip of concrete," adds Pezel.
Other areas have also been considered.
"We've shown [the City] some other spaces," Pezel says. "Under the Granville Bridge, under the chandelier, we thought that'd be nice. Or down by Crab Park," she explains. "We just need covered space for people to ride their skateboards and stay dry."
For now the benches, while fully paid for and usable, are in storage, waiting for a new home. Pezel worries that new skaters, who've picked up the activity during the pandemic, will lose interest with no dry place to practice during Vancouver's rainy months.
"We're just looking for something in concrete," says Pezel. "Roof and lights, too."
In the meantime, the city's survey on a long term skateboard plan remains open until Nov. 8.
