Friday, August 17, 2007

CM PRESS # 198


NEW SKATE PARK ON THE AGENDA

At it's regularly scheduled August 21, meeting, the City Council will decide whether or not to award a contract to RJM Design Group in the amount of $ 79, 895 for planning and conceptual design services for a new skate park that the City is considering building in Lions Park.

There are really two issues here.

1. Is Lions Park the best location for such a skate park?
2. Who should design and build a new skate park?

As of this writing, the CM PRESS doesn't have enough information to intelligently discuss the location issue. And, since we don't live near Lions Park we defer to those who do live near the park.

As to who should design and build the skate park, the CM PRESS wanted to know more. So, we went to RJM's Website. While it looks as though the firm has much experience in some areas, we only found one example of a skate park that the firm had been involved with. It seems that RJM'S past work is mostly with sports parks (baseball, etc), cemeteries, community centers and community parks rather than skate parks. Here's the link to RJM.

We then spent a few minutes doing an Internet search and came up with a company named Dreamland that seems to be one of the top firms for designing skate parks. Dreamland's skate parks also seem to have garnered the endorsements of many of the super stars of that field. Here's the link to Dreamland.

With the above in mind, we wonder if City staff has taken the time to visit some of the skate board shops and professionals in the field to get their views on design, location and other factors about this new skate park?

If we're going to build a new skate park, why not have it be one that is unique and has bragging rights?
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TRASH SCREW UP?


Residents on some streets in Mesa North were surprised today to see large item trash trucks show up on their streets--since they hadn't received notice that this was the day for such service.

As might be expected, the streets were empty of large items and the large item trucks left mostly empty.

If you're one of those who didn't get a notice about a large item pickup, you might want to call the Costa Mesa Sanitary District (949) 645-8400 and CR&R (800) 826-9677 and do a little trash talking.
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Those are our opinions. Thanks for reading them.

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