Skate Park is rolling

WORK has started on Polegate's 70,000 state-of-the-art skate park.

Designed by students at Willingdon School, the park will incorporate all the equipment necessary for some serious white-knuckle skateboarding and roller blading.

Located in the Brightling Road recreation ground, the park is the product of months of planning and fund raising and is 'a dream come true' for Polegate mayor, Cllr Ivy Scarborough.

'We have had this dream for about two years but there has always been a problem with the costs,' she said. 'Now that we have secured outside sponsorship, we can finally go ahead.

'The park has been designed by the very people who will eventually use it, so I have no doubt that it will be absolutely "wicked!"'

Funding has come from the town council, which put up 27,000 of its own money, and the Foundation for Sports and Arts, which donated nearly 28,000.

Other contributors include the Polegate Residents' Association, the twinning association, the Co-Op, Communities Against Drugs (CAD), the Sussex Police Authority and Colas Highway Services.

Project co-ordinator Rochelle McGlave said it had not all been plain sailing. 'It has been a long, hard slog to get this project off the ground.

'But it has been well worth the effort, and the level of support from local people has been very encouraging.'

It is hoped the new equipment will encourage young people not to use the town centre as a makeshift skate park in the evenings, as much damage has been caused this way in the past.

'I think we are finally providing a place for the young people to practice their sport,' said Cllr Scarborough. 'They have been accused of vandalism in the past, but I don't call it that. They just had nowhere else to go.'

When the park is finished at the end of September, the company providing the equipment has promised to bring along its 'dream team' of skaters to show off the full potential of the ramps.

Designed to cater for all age groups and skating abilities, the park will be a big hit, according to Cllr Scarborough.

However, it will also cater for the non-skaters in the pack.

'With the basketball courts down there and places for kids to just sit, I'm sure it will be well used,' she said. 'What was once a piece of unused land will soon have great facilities.

'It is a real feather in the cap of the kids who designed it. For me, it is a dream come true.'