Paradise Valley Skate Park - Phoenix, Arizona, U.S.A.

This Site Design offering to N.E. Phoenix is a must hit for anyone traveling through the area, along with the neighboring parks of Chandler and Gilbert. It has a little something for nearly everyone. The cement work is by Hardcore Shotcrete, which is by skaters for skaters, so you know that it is done up proper (Kudos to Jeff Arizona & crew). Likewise, the whole park obviously had a lot skater led input that should never be taken for granted. As a result, possibilities abound. As for specifics, the park consists of a large sunken area surrounded by banks, ? pipes, and hips. The best feature here is a tall ? pipe with two offsets that make a huge channel if'n you're feelin' up to it. You won't want to come up short here. A rail/ledge area surrounds this half of the park and has many options to choose from. It's Nice to see that this area is separate from the high speed portions of the park, again, good planning. The two bowl areas are made up of a snake run-ish type o' thing with a spine and a left hand kidney bowl. The snake run/spine area takes a little getting used to, but the lines are in there, waiting. The spine "Y's out" on both ends allowing for pocket to pocket transfers, or grind transfers via the ledge/wall. One nitpick, why is the deep end at the TOP of the downhill grade? The kidney bowl is fun, and actually kind of has a bit of a true shallow end?! This is usually my main complaint with Site Design parks, no shallow ends, or super mellow ones that are the same transition as the deep end only with the top lopped off. This one is a little better. But, on the other hand there's NO VERT IN THE DEEP END!(ok, maybe a little on the hip). This may not bother some, but I've always found a little bit of motivation in fear. Not to mention speed, and lazy vert ollies, and airs, where you don't have to hit your tail. On the plus side its smooth, the coping is set just right, and the hip is super fun. Positives = Free! NO pads! NO attendant, Lights & open till 10:00pm.Well thought out, good cement & coping work. (Can be)One push park. Winter time =prime time. Negatives= No true vert in kidney bowl = kind of missing the point of a pool, Crash up derby factor is high when busy. Beers = ticket. AZ =summer time blues.. Oh, and watch out fellas, cuz the teenage girl crew rips the bowls harder than most of their male peers?! -Chris Kelley As of Monday, November 19, 2001, the fast growing Northeastern end of the Valley of the Sun (Smog?) is home to Arizona's newest and finest skatepark. The affluent Phoenix suburb of Paradise Valley has kicked down for some serious concrete. Locally-based Site Design Group (SDG) seems to win all the desert Southwest skatepark contracts- this is their best design and execution. The coolest addition to the SDG repertoire is a near-flawless kidney. The shallow end runs about four feet while the deep end checks in at maybe seven feet. Smooth and fast, with steel coping and a nice hip- the bowl skates fast. Although pool coping would've been nice, the only complaint I can muster is the slowish trannies. Vert in the deep end would have made this thing perfect. Next in line is a snake-run style bowl. Deep end is probably seven feet deep with two sets of slight elbows down to about four feet deep. The four foot section spines into another four bowl. SDG washes out their corners for some reason; they're super mellow and hard to generate speed. A cool SDG feature is an escalator over and around the spine (if that doesn't make sense- see pictures). Unfortunately the super lazy corners in the small bowl make it tough to find the speed to make it up and over the escalator. Fruit booters apparently understand this because they just sit their asses on the escalator as if it's not even a part of the bowl. The "street" area is probably 2/3s of the park. It features all the usual slider bars, pyramid, banks and mini quarter-pipes. It's all well-constructed and seemed to be free of kinks. Only small complaint is a Dreamland-style pump bump that seems to be more bump than pump- it gets in the way more than it helps. There is a cool quarter set up for huge fly-out ollies and airs onto banks going frontside and backside. Of note is a good sized (eight feet?) gap between two maybe four foot high quarterpipes. The hordes of kids will be stoked to see Colby Carter or some other local ripper float that gap. SDG's designs are getting better with each park (Chandler, AZ, Albuquerque, NM, Gilbert, AZ, etc.) The addition of former H Street pro Chris Livingston to the design team means better, faster parks for everyone. Located on 40th Street between Bell and Union Hills, the Paradise Valley park is a nice improvement to the Arizona scene. - Tom Miller