CONTENTS DIARY OF EVENTS - The Urban Design Group

• obtain an understanding of how streets are used for street
sports
• engage with the street sports communities, to involve and
empower them in the design, location of facilities and the future
management of street sports in the city, and
• do risk assessments, develop management proposals and
comprehensively consider the safety of any facilities provided.
Throughout the development of the process, events and ideas
were widely publicised on local radio and television, newspapers
and national media such as the RIBA Journal, and on the front
cover of CABE’s 360o magazine and Streetscene. The process also
received great support by the street sports press such as Sidewalk
magazine.
CONSULTATION
The consultation process began with a meeting on 17 October
2002, and featured councillors and officers from the council,
Thames Valley Police, Milton Keynes Youth Service, officers,
English Partnerships, Milton Keynes Parks Trust, representatives
from the retail and business communities, local land owners,
local architects, artists, and skateboarders.
The aim of the meeting was to understand feelings about
street sports in the city centre. Opposing views were aired about
community safety issues and groups of young people on the
streets, fear of collisions, damage and noise. The most extreme
issue was to do with the natural leaning of some skaters towards
anarchy and a wish to do anything, anywhere, anytime.
Milton Keynes Youth Service had previously carried out
a survey of young people about the provision of street sports
facilities that indicated that the preferred location was the city
centre. It became clear that an innovative approach was needed
to fully engage that sector of the community.
The consensus meeting was arranged and fliers were
distributed to schools and youth clubs, other interested parties
and existing partners in the process. Over 50 people attended the
meeting on 6 March 2003 at Xscape in Central Milton Keynes,
and expressed wide ranging views. This event was judged to
have been a tremendous success, giving a common level of
understanding, and a number of key areas to be examined in
more depth. Moreover, it became clear that a traditional skate
park solution would not be effective: Milton Keynes is about
street sports, and so a street based solution was needed.
Working groups were led and coordinated by Milton Keynes
Council officers Andrew Armes, Head of Development and
Design as ‘champion’ and Richard Ferrington, Senior Landscape
Architect, as project manager/coordinator as the groups became
more autonomous and led by the skaters. A series of ‘strands’
were devised:
• branding
• communication
• design
• location
• risk management
• long term management, and
• funding.
In the early stages, branding and communication were the first
two most important strands, using e-mail, texting and logos
(tags). A communication and branding framework was devised,
but all the decisions about the brand and strategy were made by
the wider group. The ‘brand’, SK8MK, is now well established in
Milton Keynes (and beyond) and is instrumental to holding the
process together, being widely adopted and worn on T-shirts by
many young skaters.
In parallel a series of events were held to engage younger
members of the community:
The first event in April 2003 included a free showing of
the cult streets sports film ‘Dog Town & The Z Boys’ at a local
Above Bus station
design event
Right 2K3 consultation
Below Bus station 3D
visualisation
Opposite page Josh
Lock - a participant
in SK8MK
cinema, with workshops examining the
issues raised, a talk by professor Iain
Borden, and a free concert featuring local
bands Graveltrap, Dive, Headfly and
Tempermental. The day was attended
by 140 young skate enthusiasts at the
workshops, and 500 people at the free
concert.
The SK8MK message ‘Your city, Your
sport, Your future, get involved’ was
getting out, and more people from the
street sports community were attending
regular meetings and engaging with
others in the process.
The next event took place over the
Spring Bank holiday, when SK8MK had
a stand for three days in the CentreMK
(shopping centre) at an extreme
sports event called 2K3. The stand was
designed and run by young street sports
enthusiasts, showing films of the heritage
of streets sports in Milton Keynes, and
nearly 300 visitors were polled about
their most popular street sport features.
In June a design event took place at the
former central bus station, now little used
by buses, and a popular skate spot. Artist
Thomas Heatherwick (‘B of the Bang’ and
Urban Design | Spring 2005 | Issue 94 | 21
TOPIC