So the concrete park and I made the paper today. I also took some more pictures of the bowl now that they cleaned it up. You can see it a lot better now. The dirt jumps have a bunch of weird/sweet lines now too. Bijou has been digging out there pretty much every day all day. The article and the pictures are below.

http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/37983924.html




* By RICHARD BURGESS
* Advocate Acadiana bureau
* Published: Jan 21, 2009 - Page: 1BA - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

LAFAYETTE — A new public skateboard and bicycle park could be open as early as next month.

Workers are putting the finishing touches on what the casual observer might take for a large concrete swimming pool at Youth Park off Johnston Street near the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

Within a few weeks, skaters and bicyclists will be shooting up the sides and carving the edges of the deep concrete bowl at Lafayette’s first public ramp park.

“We have a lot of kids and young adults doing this,” said Greg Gautreaux, manager of maintenance and athletic programs for the city’s parks and recreation department.

“Actually, they have no public facilities to go to.”

The park is likely a welcome change for many bike riders and skaters, who are usually turned away from public property rather than accommodated.

“We run ’em off,” quipped Gautreaux.

The city has two private skate parks — one open only on a limited basis — but the public park off Johnston Street will be free.

It will be only the second public concrete park in the state, following Hammond, and the first to allow bicycles, said ULL student Ooti Billeaud, a bike rider and skateboarder who worked with the city for the past four years to make the park a reality.

Billeaud drew up the basic design for the park.

He said the pool is 6 feet deep with a 7-foot extension along one edge.

On Tuesday, workers were carefully smoothing down the concrete in the large bowl and had just one small section left to pour.

Lafayette was considering a much larger ramp park about six years ago but was never able to pull together the money.

“Phase one never got off the ground because the bids came in over budget,” Gautreaux said.

The park under construction is a scaled-down version, costing the city about $80,000.

Gautreaux said he expects the park to open by late February.

“Based on the need and use of it, we’d like to see it expand,” Gautreaux said.

He said one possible location for another ramp park would be at the 18-acre Thomas Park on Geraldine Street.

Public ramp parks of various sizes are open in Shreveport, Baton Rouge and Hammond.