It may be fortunate, then, that the newest and most promising prospective location for a real skatepark is about half a mile southwest of the memorial at Penn Valley Park.
Over the past couple of years, a task force made up of city planners and skaters has studied potential locations for a skatepark. The group eventually identified Gillham Park as a strong possibility, but neighbors opposed the idea ("Hot About Wheels," August 28, 2003). Although the task force hasn't given up on that site, recent attention has turned to Penn Valley Park.
The task force's proposal went over remarkably well at a February 7 meeting at Penn Valley Community College, where fifty or so neighborhood activists, skaters, parks commissioners and residents met to discuss the park's future. Skateboarders might turn out to be the Kansas City, Missouri, Parks and Recreation Department's first line of defense against public sex.
As Parks Commissioner Bob Lewellen pointed out, the memorial has a reputation -- and it's not the good kind. Lewellen recalled a 2000 meeting of the National Recreation and Parks Association in St. Louis that he attended with about 7,000 employees from parks systems around the country. At a seminar put together by park rangers and police to address "problem parks" -- where people cruise for drugs and sex -- a picture of Liberty Memorial flashed onto a screen. "It was a shock to see that," Lewellen said.
In other cities, he said, skateparks that are well-lighted and 24-hour-accessible have driven away undesirable activities.
Dick Woods, the vice president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, the new $200 million headquarters for which will be Penn Valley's neighbor to the southeast, said he was impressed by the skatepark task force's organization and presentation.
However, Steve Berkheiser, Liberty Memorial's executive director, worried that skaters who were bored with their own park might make his memorial a second playground.
Skaters scoff at that logic. Stephan Baker, 21, is a member of the task force and an employee of Lovely, a skate shop on 18th Street. "Most of the groundwork and cement is so rough it's almost unskateable," he says of Liberty Memorial. "Think about it. You've got this awesome, perfectly designed, perfectly smooth skatepark in your right hand, and this really, really rough, janky, rocky terrain in your other hand." Skaters, he says, "won't look twice at Liberty Memorial, because they'll see their skatepark and their eyes will light up."
However, other interests have their eyes on the same stretch of land, which runs roughly from the Scout statue south to the BMA Tower.
By 2007, when construction on the new Federal Reserve building is complete, as many as 1,100 employees could be jogging around Penn Valley Park on their lunch breaks. Joining them will be the folks working for the new DST-developed, $380 million IRS building outside the park's northwest corner.
And park neighbors have long worried about DST Realty's rumored plans for a housing development inside the park. At the February 7 meeting, the public got its first glimpse of the actual drawings when Jim Calcara of CDFM2 Architecture presented colorful posters and maps showing a series of lakes starting near the Firefighters' Fountain and extending north down the hill to the park's fishing pond. A pedestrian bridge could help people cross Broadway, he said, and an elevator could lift people from the roadside to the top of the bluff.
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I have been following the rumors of potential private development in Penn Valley Park with great interest.... and angst. I spent my formative childhood years in that park, have loved it for 57 subsequent years, and am currently writing a history of the area, which I hope to publish.
The very thought that any part of George Kessler's magnificent contribution to Kansas City might be appropriated for private gain is appalling, reinforcing my well-developed and wholly justified disgust with "developers," those cretins who care not a whit for the public good. They represent the same mentality as the "mossbacks" at the turn of the previous century who saw no need for parks or green space when the same land could be used to make money.
August Meyer and George Kessler must be rolling in their graves. Please, Kansas City, don't let the nose of this camel under your tent. This land is ours, not theirs.
Tom Liston
2326 Echo Valley Drive
Stow, Ohio 44224
330-688-8062
I have been following the rumors of potential private development in Penn Valley Park with great interest.... and angst. I spent my formative childhood years in that park, have loved it for 57 subsequent years, and am currently writing a history of the area, which I hope to publish. The very thought that any part of George Kessler's magnificent contribution to Kansas City might be appropriated for private gain is appalling, reinforcing my well-developed and wholly justified disgust with "developers," those cretins who care not a whit for the public good. They represent the same mentality as the "mossbacks" at the turn of the previous century who saw no need for parks or green space when the same land could be used to make money. August Meyer and George Kessler must be rolling in their graves. Please, Kansas City, don't let the nose of this camel under your tent. This land is ours, not theirs. Tom Liston 2326 Echo Valley Drive Stow, Ohio 44224 330-688-8062
I have been following the rumors of potential private development in Penn Valley Park with great interest.... and angst. I spent my formative childhood years in that park, have loved it for 57 subsequent years, and am currently writing a history of the area, which I hope to publish. The very thought that any part of George Kessler's magnificent contribution to Kansas City might be appropriated for private gain is appalling, reinforcing my well-developed and wholly justified disgust with "developers," those cretins who care not a whit for the public good. They represent the same mentality as the "mossbacks" at the turn of the previous century who saw no need for parks or green space when the same land could be used to make money. August Meyer and George Kessler must be rolling in their graves. Please, Kansas City, don't let the nose of this camel under your tent. This land is ours, not theirs. Tom Liston 2326 Echo Valley Drive Stow, Ohio 44224 330-688-8062
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