Situation

Beth­lehem Skate Park is located at SOS Children’s Village boar­ding school close to the histo­rical place Shephard´s Field in eastern Beth­lehem. To accom­mo­date for the growing number of perma­nent resi­dents as well as regular visi­ting school kids, the manage­ment wished to expand and enhance their site. The area to the villages east at that time was a worn-out play­ground that was unused and ther­e­fore desi­gnated to be repur­posed. In colla­bo­ra­tion with Skate-Aid and Beton­land­schaften the layout was adjusted to fit a field for ball games, tradi­tional play­ground elements like slides, swings, etc. as well as a skate­park of reasonable size.

The popu­la­tion of Beth­lehem still suffers under high poverty and unem­ploy­ment rates. Around 46% of the popu­la­tion is living under the govern­mental poverty level. Most of the young people who reside at SOS Children´s Village have lost their parents through warlike conflicts or terrors. They are in need of proper educa­tion which is mostly absent in the public sector. But not only educa­tion is missing: Children need a place to hang out and spend their free time, to work off their energy, meet up with friends and make new ones.

Bethlehem Skate Park

The design goal was to make the best use of the pre-exis­ting terrain, trees and other features to create a natural, organic flow and not inter­rupt the land­scape by forcing a shape onto it. A nice effect of this was that use of mate­rial and labour could be kept at a minimum, which resulted in low expenses for the NGO’s. All while the required stan­dards for skate­parks still could be matched resul­ting in a durable cons­truc­tion, which is up to par with modern parks around the world. The subs­truc­ture is made up from load-bearing layers of gravel, topped with rein­forced concrete that is smoot­hened in a special treat­ment. This way the rolling sounds and drag on the wheels are reduced resul­ting in a smooth ride without obstruc­tions or exces­sive noise. Still the grey concrete surface prompts some­what unsett­ling asso­cia­tions in a city divided by a wall from the same mate­rial. The whole park was ther­e­fore finally coloured in cheerful colours mostly with the help of the children living in the village. Along­side with volun­teers from both Germany and Pales­tine who were involved in buil­ding Beth­lehem Skate Park, super­vised by a repre­sen­ta­tive of Beton­land­schaften.

Since the sports area is on the villages property and located behind most of its infra­struc­ture inclu­ding a gatekeeper’s house, it is easy to monitor people ente­ring and leaving. Ther­e­fore, the spot is some­what secluded which under­lines the safe-space character and general idea of the park. The children do not have to be super­vised and can play in peace while still bene­fit­ting from simple and effec­tive protec­tion against poten­ti­ally harmful outsi­ders. A sepa­rate main­ten­ance entrance with a lockable gate is on street level and makes for easy car and wheel­chair acces­si­bi­lity.

Beth­lehem Skate Park also chal­lenges the estab­lished look of a skate­park. Obviously, the park is made of concrete, but who said that it has to be grey? The Idea of the park was to give it a new look and even achieve an optical illu­sion by projec­ting two colourful images on the surface and trace them with paint. That is why the lines look straight although the area is not flat. Once coloured, the process is never over. Children want to have change in their ever­yday life. This is why the design of the park can be changed by kids toge­ther with their teachers. It perso­na­lizes the whole area to be exactly how the users want to have it. The possi­bi­li­ties to improve art and design skills of the students are endless.

Goals

With only volun­tary work and under the tight budget rest­ric­tions of huma­ni­ta­rian aid, it was still possible to create a unique, in-situ skate­park that is well within the reco­g­nised inter­na­tional stan­dards while chal­len­ging pre-exis­ting expec­ta­tions on how a skate­park is supposed to look like at the same time.

Beth­lehem Skate Park was deve­loped to increase self-confi­dence and corpo­rate feeling amongst the children through sports and exer­cises. The new skate park was built just inside the property of the school in order to keep it as close to the children as possible. In this safe place, the children can spend their time without being influenced by the poli­tical debate and by dangers happe­ning in Beth­lehem. They can discover the world of skate­boar­ding and learn self-reli­ance!

While plan­ning and cons­truc­ting the skate­park one of the most important aspects was to involve its future users in this process. As a conse­quence, the kids could design the area for them­selves and therein gain important expe­ri­ence in handi­craft and craft­sman­ship. Addi­tio­nally, it increased the posi­tive atti­tude towards the project. Those actions broa­dened young people´s skills and possibly influenced their job pros­pects. Having constant access to sport acti­vi­ties such as skate­boar­ding can not only improve the self-confi­dence of children, but also give them a plat­form to work on their skills and expe­ri­ence the progress of trai­ning. Skate­boar­ding is a very perso­na­lized sport that brings young people toge­ther at the same time.

Tradi­tional huma­ni­ta­rian aid projects mainly focus on one single matter that is often addressed without conside­ring its surroun­ding social system, which results in not sustainable results. A skate­park on the other hand provides a strongly empowe­ring plat­form for the youn­gest to build upon. It enables them to change their tradi­tional mindset on their own terms and build a better future for them­selves and their country instead of telling them what to do and how to do it.