Future of Historic Tampa Skatepark Lies in Hands of the City; Skateboarders Want a Voice

Downtown Tampa is home to one of three remaining skateparks in the United States from the golden era of skateparks in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The concrete bowl was built in 1978 within the Perry Harvey Sr. Park in the Central Avenue neighborhood, just two years after the first skatepark was built in Port Orange, Florida. Between then and 1982, approximately 200 skateparks were built. As one of the three remaining examples of original 1970s skatepark architecture, the "Bro Bowl," as it is affectionately known by its users, has become a beloved destination for skateboarders throughout the world. The original concrete structure has been well-preserved by both the City and the local skateboarding community. The future of the skatepark, however, is currently under threat of demolition by the City of Tampa, and the threat is not being taken lightly by the skateboarding community.

The City seeks to demolish the skatepark to make way for the redesign of the Perry Harvey Sr. Park located to the west of the much larger proposed development, Encore! The Encore! project will include 2,030 residential units, 50,000 square feet of commercial, and 59,000 square feet of office space. Ten percent of the residential units will be affordable housing units. The Encore! property was once the location of Central Park Village, a large public housing complex within the Central Avenue neighborhood, which was demolished in 2006 to make way for the new development.

The Central Avenue neighborhood has a rich history, which the new mixed-use development and park seeks to honor. The neighborhood is a historic neighborhood within Downtown Tampa where African-American residents and businesses were initially segregated to, but which later became a vibrant, bustling neighborhood for the African-American community. The Central Avenue neighborhood deteriorated significantly after the I-275 and I-4 were built, and after race riots broke out in 1967. The City of Tampa’s redesign of Perry Harvey Sr. Park will include exhibits honoring the African-American community’s history in the Central Avenue neighborhood.

On May 15, the City of Tampa submitted a report for review by the Florida Division of Historical Resources outlining four alternatives for the future of the skatepark:

• preserve the skatepark in its current location
• relocate the skatepark to another location
• reconstruct a new skatepark in another location
• remove the skatepark without replacement

Mayor Buckhorn received a letter of determination from Tim Parsons, the Deputy State Historic Preservation Officer, which recommended preservation of the existing skatepark, but agreed that construction of a skate park in another location would be an adequate solution.

Mayor Bob Buckhorn has spoken openly against preserving the skatepark, saying "it’s not historical, and it’s marginally significant," and has further indicated that the preferred alternative would be constructing a new skatepark at the northern end of the park. Proposed plans do indeed show a new skatepark will be located against I-4 to the north of the park.

The skateboarding community and Tampa Preservation Inc. has been largely opposed to this alternative as the new skateboard park would require that City of Tampa officials stop by the new park frequently to check that skateboarders are carrying recreation cards and wearing safety equipment. The new skatepark would also prohibit graffiti, which has long been a feature of the existing skatepark, and emblematic of the skateboard culture.

In response to the City of Tampa’s lack of inclusion of the skateboarding community in the fate of the Bro Bowl, pro-skatepark preservationists successfully added the skatepark to the National Register of Historic Places in 2013. These preservationists have also claimed that the City has excluded them from involvement in the design process. Consultants that were sought from the local skateboarding community included just one paid consultant, the director of the private skatepark, Skate Park of Tampa, who is in agreement with the City that the skatepark should be demolished.

The Encore! project and park redesign were scheduled to begin construction in the spring of 2014, but the projects’ schedules have been delayed until they resolve issues with the skatepark.

Ultimately, the Bro Bowl’s fate lies in the hands of the City of Tampa, but the City should make an improved effort to recognize both histories as a valid history, and refrain from designating one historic group’s landmark as "marginally significant." After all, small, niche cultures with long histories merit just as much consideration in historic preservation as do prevalent cultures. Whether or not the skatepark is preserved, there should at least be a demonstrated effort to include and listen to concerns of both neighborhood groups, and to involve them in the design process.

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