After many months of delay due to a lawsuit, the $3.3 million San Juan Capistrano skatepark project is finally making progress once again.
“The City Council remains committed to bringing a skatepark to the San Juan Capistrano community and looks forward to an anticipated grand opening in summer 2024,” said Mayor Howard Hart.
This skatepark has been in the works for years, initially proposed to the city in 2017 but requested by residents and community members for decades.
Originally slated to be finished with construction by this summer, a lawsuit — filed by local nonprofit Preserve Our Farm San Juan Capistrano — halted the project. The group alleged that the city did not “conduct a proper environmental review” for the skatepark planned near the San Juan Capistrano Ecology Center, which is the site of the former Kinoshita Farm property.
The lawsuit was filed on May 1, 2022, only a few days after the initial approval of the park.
The San Juan Capistrano City Council discussed the matter in an executive session closed to the public during a meeting on May 3, 2022, but no action had been reported since. Now, over a year later, the project is showing signs of life.
The lawsuit has since settled, said assistant city manager Matisse Reischl, and San Juan Capistrano is in the process of preparing its Environmental Impact Report.
CEQA consultants and city staff, Reischl said, “are finalizing the draft document and anticipate the 45-day public review period will begin later this month with Planning Commission and City Council public hearings in the fall (or) winter to reconsider the project.”
Pending certification of the EIR and the City Council reapproving the design and land use actions, construction would likely begin early next year, she said.
“This is something the community supported, and it’s gratifying that the lawsuit is now settled,” said Eric Bodge, a Los Angeles resident who has family in the San Juan Capistrano area and had attended the initial meeting for this project.
“I know a lot of skaters in the area have been disappointed by the stagnation in this project for a long time,” said Bodge. “It’s exciting there seems to be some indication the construction may get back on track.”
Grindline Skateparks, founded by the late legendary skateboarder Mark “Monk” Hubbard, was hired to design the project, as it has built hundreds of parks nationally.
Bodge says Gridline’s design is “absolutely perfect.”
The 20,000-square-foot skatepark will have design touches that reflect San Juan Capistrano’s history, such as Spanish mission-style gates and walls as well as artwork of swallows throughout the park.
The park’s design has three bowls, of varying depths, as well as a large street plaza that includes banks, hips, handrails, stairs, flat rails, and many other features.
“The area has really needed something like this for a while. The facility will be a fantastic resource for the whole community to enjoy,” said Bodge.
Other features of the park will be a restroom, farm-themed play structure, shade structures and grass berm seating as well as a new multi-use trail connecting Via Positiva to Camino Del Avion.
