• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.44 no.6
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• pp.26-39
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• 2016

This research paper explores the process of developing skateboarding spaces in urban parks. Skateboarding is one of the most popular sport activities representative of urban parks. This research paper will analyze the process of introducing skateboarding activities into park spaces and their acceptance by the general public as well as derive meaningful general implications for park space development planning. The research method is a discourse analysis of newspaper articles regarding skateboarding issued between the 1960s and 2010s. These articles are the main resources to show the creation of a skateboarding culture, generation of skate park spaces, and the extinction of these spaces during the research period. The result of this research is as follows. There are reasons that allowed for the creation of skate park spaces in urban parks. First of all, positive associations that people have regarding skateboarding have influenced the park's users and operators' decisions that a park is proper space for skateboarding activities, and the agreement to remodel the park space. Secondly, skate parks became a space for multiple-uses that can be shared with other emerging sports, which resulted in a building boom of skateboarding spaces in urban parks. Thirdly, urban parks and their new culture of active sports became a marketing tool used by local governments to attract new inhabitants to their new towns. On the contrary, there are three main reasons for the deterioration of skate parks. First of all, within parks in which skateboarding activities collided with other park usage, the skate parks disappeared. Secondly, skate parks built specifically for competitive skateboarding events and without consideration of casual skaters disappeared, as these facilities were not sustainable for use in the long term. Thirdly, the golden age of skate park skateboarding did not last long, as skateboarding trends shifted from trick performance to street skating, where skate parks are no longer needed. For this reasons, the exclusive use of park space for skateboarding activities has faded from public interest. The findings of this research suggest how sport activities should be introduced to urban parks. At first, each park's management needs to identify a sport suitable for long-term development, and not only plan for temporal events or follow fleeting trends. Secondly, the park's management systems should reflect a type of sport activity that would not only be popular at the beginning of the spaces development, but also take into consideration how these activities will change over time. Lastly, in cases where there are conflicts between sport activities and other activities in urban parks, attempts should be made to suggest feasible solutions other than the liquidation of sport spaces. This study explains the development process of sport spaces offered in urban parks, by thorough research of the process of acceptance of skateboarding activities in current urban park systems. This conclusion also indicates further areas for research with the purpose of understanding general best practices in urban parks sport space planning.