MAESTEG: First look at the £270,000 concrete skatepark for the Welfare Park, and riders have a fortnight to change it

Maverick Skateparks, the firm behind the Mumbles seafront park and this year's Brackla build, has published a 34.5m by 15m concept with a spine, two "volcanoes" and a 1.8m quarterpipe extension. Its designers are in the park on Monday 5 October, and online comments close on Friday 9 October.

Kit Peters
6 Min Read
Artist's impression of the proposed concrete skatepark at Maesteg Welfare Park, showing a spine ramp, bowls, quarterpipes and a rail set in grass beside a tarmac path, with skaters and families around it
How the new Maesteg Welfare Park skatepark could look: Maverick Skateparks' concept for the 34.5m by 15m sprayed-concrete park. (Image: Maverick Skateparks)

The metal ramps at Maesteg Welfare Park are on their way out, and the first pictures of what replaces them are here: a 34.5m by 15m sprayed-concrete park with a spine ramp, two “volcanoes”, hip quarterpipes and a 1.8m extension at the far end.

Bridgend County Borough Council says it has secured £270,000 for the initial work. The concept comes from Maverick Skateparks, the Poole firm that built the Mumbles seafront skatepark and this year’s new park at Brackla.

Nothing is fixed yet. Riders, parents and neighbours get two chances to change it: Maverick’s designers will be in the Welfare Park on Monday 5 October from 4.30pm to 7.30pm, and comments can be left online until Friday 9 October.

What is in the concept: a 1.8m quarterpipe extension and two “volcanoes”

The drawings show a long street run down one side of the park: a 1.35m flatbank at the near end, a round flat bar rail at 300mm, and a long ledge on the flat beside the path.

The middle is built for flow. A 1.2m spine ramp sits between two 500mm rollovers, next to a blend hip and two rolled-top “volcanoes”, the rounded humps riders carve around or pop off, each 900mm high.

The far end steps up. A 1.2m jumpbox leads into hip quarterpipes and a 1.8m quarterpipe extension, the tallest feature on the plan, while a 900mm quarterpipe rises to a 1.65m sub box along the back edge.

A “deep platform” standing area at the smaller end gives people somewhere to watch or wait a turn, and two benches, two bins and a safety sign sit along the existing tarmac path.

Maverick Skateparks concept board for the new Maesteg skatepark, with 23 numbered features including quarterpipes, a spine ramp, rollovers, volcanoes, a jumpbox and benches, and the park dimensions of 34.5m by 15m
The concept board numbers every feature, from the 1.35m flatbank at one end to the 1.8m quarterpipe extension at the other. (Image: Maverick Skateparks)

The aerial overlay places the whole thing on the grass beside that path, with grass mounds shaped around the edges rather than fences.

Aerial photograph of Maesteg Welfare Park with the outline of the proposed concrete skatepark overlaid on the grass beside the existing tarmac path, next to the playing fields
Where it would sit: the new park overlaid on an aerial view of the Welfare Park, beside the existing tarmac path. (Image: Maverick Skateparks)

Brackla went first, and it opened in April

The current Maesteg park is a set of metal ramps on a tarmac base, the standard issue most Welsh towns got in the 2000s. The council has described it as popular but ageing.

Sprayed concrete is what replaced Brackla’s old ramps this year. Maverick designed and built that park, which opened with a jam session on Wednesday 1 April, and in a testimonial on the firm’s website the council’s principal regeneration officer called it the borough’s first in-situ concrete skatepark.

The Brackla scheme was reported to have cost £250,000, and the same officer said it went from concept to completion in a matter of months once the design was settled.

Maverick has been spraying concrete parks since 2007. Its Welsh work includes Mumbles, where the park on the prom opened in 2023 after years of legal wrangling. Porthcawl’s concrete bowl and Aberdare’s park are theirs too.

Cornelly and Bryntirion next in the queue

Maesteg is not the end of it. The council says plans are also in development for skateparks at Cornelly and Bryntirion.

Both have been on the table at community council level for a while: Laleston Community Council’s masterplan for Bryntirion Community Park on Llangewydd Road included a skate park when it went out to consultation last year, and Cornelly Community Council has been consulting on a skatepark for Cornelly Community Park.

How to have your say before 9 October

Turn up at Maesteg Welfare Park, Heol Ty Gwyn, on Monday 5 October between 4.30pm and 7.30pm, where the Maverick team will take questions and suggestions and talk through the plans.

If you cannot make it, the plans and a comment form are at maverickskateparks.co.uk/maesteg-skatepark until Friday 9 October.

The council says the feedback will shape the final design. No date has been given for when the diggers arrive, or for how long the old ramps stay open in the meantime.

Author

Kit Peters

Kit Peters is a journalist and the editor of Swansea Bay News, covering Swansea, Neath Port Talbot and Carmarthenshire since 2020.


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Kit Peters is a journalist and the editor of Swansea Bay News, covering Swansea, Neath Port Talbot and Carmarthenshire since 2020.
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