Tuesday, April 30

Love Park Closes

By Sean Mulligan
EXPN.com

April 25th…if you skate you will probably remember this date for a while, or at least you should. The 25th is the day that the City of Philadelphia closed down Love Park for renovations, changes that plan on making it unskateable once it is done.

The Park, which is officially known as JFK Plaza, is the home of the famous LOVE sculpture, done by Robert Indiana, thus the name. The park has always been a haven for local skaters and in recent years, for skaters worldwide. Both during the day and late into the night, pros and everyday skaters could be found tearing up the friendly terrain. In any given month you can open one of several skate magazines and almost be assured to see one or more photos taken at Love Park.

While skating at Love has always been illegal, it has been tolerated to a certain extent. There was always the occasional need to crack down and hand out some tickets just to keep the city happy though. Since the park is a gathering place for people living downtown, not to mention a tourist attraction of sorts, the city of Philadelphia was never willing to let the skaters get too much control. Public opinion was not in their favor either, with many of the city's residents feeling that the park was slowly being destroyed.

Like it or not, this place was MADE for skating.

Over the past few months the City had cultivated a plan to renovate the park to the tune of about $800,000. Changes include the replacement of the marble ledges and benches with wooden ones. Those great marble slates that make up the floor of the park and are great for propping up and launching off of? Gone, replaced by large areas of grass. And what about the fountain? The fountain where Andrew Reynolds, Brian Wenning and several other kids were in a gnar showdown a few months back? The future of that is uncertain, but there probably won't be many more people hitting that gap any longer.

So where do you go from here? Well, as of April 25th there will be large fences gating off the whole park until the project is done, which is supposedly around July 5th. The city has promised to work with local skaters and the Franklin's Paine advocacy group to find a new location for a park to be built. The options so far are less than desirable.

The long-term affect this will have on the Philly skate scene is unknown. One of the things about Love though was that it wasn't just a great skate spot for photo or video footage but that it provided a great sense of community for skaters from all over.

Want to help out? Here's what you can do for now. There will be a few additional meetings to come to a concrete solution on Love Park, one of which is on May 8th. You can also check out Franklin's Paine to support the cause.