!["Beauty - straight success ... what we [can] do if we put our voices together and don't let any politician or anyone tell us 'No' ... about what we need for our community," Cancel told WAMC when asked what the park represented. "... it starts with a conversation and hopefully, ends with a solution - and that's exactly what we did, and it is now in its fruition: an all-wheels park, a permanent all-wheels park in the city of Springfield."](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/b64c0b7/2147483647/strip/true/crop/3682x2268+175+0/resize/880x542!/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F7a%2Fcc%2Fbfce8a51476391168bb3f7f942dd%2Fyolanda-cancel-6-26-25.jpg)
Bike riders and skateboarders have a place to call their own in Springfield, Massachusetts. The city formally welcomed its first bike and skate park this week – capping off years of “grinding” advocacy.
Ollies, kickflips and McTwists are finding a new home in Springfield.
Thursday’s ribbon-cutting for Gurdon Bill Park couldn’t come soon enough for the newly-refurbished green space. Officials say ever since the cement settled and construction recently wrapped, young skaters have been packing the new ramps, rails and other amenities that came with the $2 million project.
As elected officials and community organizers cut the ribbon, teens like Anders Potter of Douglas, Mass., were already shredding.
“[A] super-smooth concrete park – lot of street, built really well for the area … has something for everyone … they did a great job,” the 17-year-old said.
Nolan Fonda, a landscape architect with GZA and part of the crew that helped bring the park to life, explained to WAMC what the park has to offer in skater terms.
“There’s a Pier 7 out ledge, there's a four-stair with a handrail, there's a bank-to-ledge, there's a bank-to-curb, there's a Euro Gap with a seven-stair handrail … a hubba on both sides, so you can skate it front side or back side,” he said. “There's a bank-to-rail over there, couple hips, flat bar and a ledge.”
Off Liberty Street, near I-291, the bike and skateboard concourse is just part of the 12,000-square foot park to get a makeover.
A new splash pad, paths and swings were part of a transformation that turned what was more-or-less a small field with some benches and homeless encampments into a recreation hub.
As multiple city leaders pointed out Thursday, the project can be traced back to local activists, led in-part by community organizer, Yolanda Cancel.
“This skate park should be Yolanda Park, right here,” said 10th Hampden State Representative Carlos Gonzalez. “Gurdon Bill Park is the park, but that skate diamond or whatever you call [it] - that should be Yolanda’s.”
As Cancel tells WAMC, the fight for something like the new skate park goes back as far as the 80s.
In 2017, she and others started to roll up their sleeves – working with the group 413 BikeLife to not just eventually revitalize part of one of the city’s densely-populated neighborhoods, but give would-be Tony Hawks a special spot to ride freely and safely.
Cancel says there’s been no shortage of support.
“… for hundreds of different people to say, ‘Yes, we need this,’ but to see how many hundreds of voices and hundreds of people … parents with kids with autism, saying, ‘Hey, I have to leave the city to take my kid to a bike park, why can't we have one here?” Cancel said, adding the project’s had enough supporters over the years to fill the park to the brink.
The work took time, though. She and other advocates made their case for years before the city’s park commission approved a feasibility study. A million-dollar National Park Service Land & Water Conservation Fund grant would arrive in 2023, with another million coming from the city to match it.
Productive meetings with city officials and stakeholders yielded result after result. Cancel says a key hurdle was cleared when she and others convinced Mayor Domenic Sarno potential bikers would be sticking to their BMX’s.
“It became clear it was going to happen when the mayor actually found out that it wasn’t a motorcycle park that we were talking about,” she explained. “I get why he thought [that] - because it was 413BikeLife… I could understand why he thought ‘Oh, motorcycle.’ But when we had that meeting at the South End Citizens Council to say, ‘Hey mayor, it's a non-motorized wheel park,’ he said, ‘Oh… yes, we can do this.’”
Sarno says he’s proud to see the project come to fruition – the latest in a series of park revitalizations during his time as mayor, part of what his office says is more than $111 million invested in enhancing and creating new parks.
He adds that kids on bikes riding in the middle of the road has long been a concern of his – and having a space like Gurdon Bill will make a difference.
“I’ll see the kids on the bikes or I’ll see the kids on the skateboards, on the streets and stuff, and many times, I’ll stop, I’ll talk to them – I’ll say ‘Geez, what you’re doing is unbelievable. I'd fall right on my behind. But do me a favor…’ - and most of the kids are great – ‘… can you stay close to the curb or stay close to the sidewalk?’” Sarno said. “Now, they have the opportunity to do this here, and maybe… we could have our next Tony Hawk here!”
Louis Sacco of 413 BikeLife says at the end of the day, facilities like the new skate park will save lives.
His group, a community of bicyclists sporting the slogan “Wheels Up, Guns Down,” is all about giving local youth opportunities to express themselves and ride instead of potentially turning down a darker path.
“This will save lives, this will keep kids out of jail, this will keep kids from dying, this will keep kids from riding in the street and getting hit,” Sacco told WAMC, adding that his group hopes to soon hold events at the park. “The goal is to try to get these kids here, get as many of these events as we can during the seasons that you can ride, to keep these kids out of trouble, keep these kids safe.”
