Heat on deck at Canada’s best Skateboard park

What does it take to be Canada’s best Skateboard park?

Size matters. At 44,000 square feet, The Plaza at The Forks in Winnipeg is the largest skate park in Canada.

So does flow. Good design, smooth concrete, nothing to snag your deck on.

But it takes more than just halfpipes and ramps to make a great skate park. For it to be a destination, it has to have plenty of urban features standing in for the rails, ledges and planter boxes that provide the variety and challenges that usually attract skaters to private property.

The Plaza, opened at The Forks in 2006, was designed to get skateboarders, inline skaters and BMX bikers off the streets and into an urban landscape that gives them a place with lots of features to challenge their skills.

A year after The Plaza opened, Tony Hawk dropped by for a visit.

“It’s everything it’s cracked up to be,” he said of the bowl. On his Secret Skatepark Tour 3 DVD, he called The Forks park “super fun.”

One of the Top 14 skate parks in North America -- that’s what a Wall Street Journal story said, in 2009. It was the only skateboard park in Canada included on their elite skate park list.

Even if you don’t have kids (or grandkids) who’d love this spectacular play-park, it’s always worth a visit just to see the fantastic things kids can do, with just a bike or a pair of skates or a plank with wheels.

For recognizing that kids here should have the best skatepark in Canada, I want to join the kids in applauding the vision of Ida Albo, managing partner of The Fort Garry Hotel, who had the original idea and the conviction to help push it through and to retired Winnipeg businessman and hometown hero James W. Burns. He gave $2.2 million to make it happen (the final cost was just under $3 million; the difference paid by tax dollars).

Open year-round!

In winter, The Forks skateboard park becomes a city-centre snowboard park and skating rink, next to the toboggan chute.