Skaters can’t seem to wait any longer for the new skateboard park at Williamsbridge Oval Park. Though the park is not officially open there has already been several sightings of skaters getting their wheels dirty. 

Video taken by the Norwood News shows three skaters practicing on in the skateboard park’s open space that’s surrounding by a perimeter fence on Aug. 14.  

Demands for a skateboard park go back to 2004, though it wasn’t made possible yet until after a $750,000 allocation by Councilman Andrew Cohen in 2013. Design of the skateboard park was finished in June 2015 with construction beginning in February of 2018. The park was initially supposed to finish construction in February 2019. The delay was caused by water found inside the concrete during the last leg of construction. The total cost of the park is $977,000.

Previously, skaters in Norwood and neighboring areas were either traveling to other skate parks or skating on the ledges at different parts of the Oval.

Jonathan Madeira, a local skater, pointed out that the fence surrounding the skateboard park was left open for skaters by workers, leaving many skaters to take advantage of the skateboard park during late afternoons. 

For skaters like Madeira, the construction of the skateboard park means a lot to him, and his friends after they made efforts to see to see a change. “We all came together and put this idea together, and we all went to commissioners, anybody whose of higher in the parks department and talk to them,” Madeira said.  

In a statement, the Parks Department said, “The fencing around the skateboard park is maintained by the construction contractor who is building the skateboard park. We will inform them of the hole.”