Flagler County Will Spend $250,000 to Fix Wadsworth Skate Park, Exploring Concrete Upgrade in Future

The Flagler County Commission agreed today to spend up to $250,000 to repair and rebuild steel ramps at Wadsworth Skate Park near Flagler Beach in the coming year, while investigating a plan–but not a commitment–to rebuild the park with concrete ramps and possibly include a pump track for cyclists. But that $2 million plan would be more of a hope than a reality.

The commission green-lighted the plan this afternoon during discussions on the coming year’s budget and the county’s priorities. From the public’s perspective, the skate park’s needed repairs have been lingering for a couple of years. The commission last discussed the park 13 months ago, when it approved four new pickleball courts there for $100,000 by redesigning existing tennis courts, but passed on skate park improvements. Yet money was available for skate park repairs. (See: “County Not Yet Stoked for Skate Park Improvements But Approves 4 Pickleball Courts at Wadsworth Park.”)




Commission Chair Andy Dance had asked Petito to bring up the project again. “There’s a group of skaters out there that see a big plan for an expansion of the park, but the realities are the costs,” Dance said. “So we’ve got the ability to replace half of those steel ramps and structures for a fraction of the cost of the of a new concrete Park.”

Alternately, the project could end up on the county’s long-term capital improvement plan. “The $250,000 was previously budgeted. They could have immediately start that replacement, but wanted to have a discussion on a more expansive park, especially with some new commissioners on. But the availability of the $250,000 is still there to be able to do those improvements quickly.”

Petito didn’t question the needs for repairs, but she was also interested in hearing about the commissioners’ “desire to do something different there.” Skaters would love a concrete park. It’s more durable. The design of a new concrete skate park would cost $24,000. Construction would be in the range of $1.3 to $1.7 million. The addition of a pump track for bikes would add $350,000.




“The skate park naturally would go where the skate park exists, but the pump track would be constructed kind of next to it, or joining to it,” Petito said, discouraging the idea of building the two tracks in phases since the contractors would likely overlap.

The county doesn’t have that $2 million, but it could work toward that over the next few years, with the steel repairs serving as a bridge despite the eventual rust. The steel ramps rust because of their proximity to the ocean. They’ve been replaced twice since the park was built in 2000. In the past, some of the ramps were repaired, some had to be removed after becoming unsafe. Some of the equipment is so old that replacement parts are no longer available.

“You could replace half of what was the existing equipment out there” for $250,000, Petito said, citing a quote from the American Ramp Company. One option would be to replace the steel equipment even though it will rust. The administration’s thought is that if the county were to build a concrete park at some point, the equipment at Wadsworth could be relocated to Hidden Trails Park on the west side of the county (in Daytona North), where a 20-acre parcel has only been half developed for the existing park. The other half could be developed into a skate park. The steel would survive longer there, since it would rust less.

Kim Carney and Pam Richardson, the two newly seated commissioners, were cautiously intrigued by all the possibilities, but were not ready to commit to too much. The county doesn’t have a count of the number of people who use the skate park. Petito said it’s “heavily used every day,” more so on weekends and holidays. “It’s not just kids. There’s young adults, even older adults that that do use it.”




Carney was curious about turning the park into a larger draw. “If you’re creating a draw, like a regional draw, it would be a much larger facility than this,” Petito said. “What we’re looking at is replacing the existing, which is just under 24,000 square feet.” A facility with a larger footprint would cost more than $2 million. Petito researched a 10,000 square foot facility currently under construction in Panama City for $1.4 million.

Clearly, Dance did not want the item pushed back one more time. He coaxed, suggested, summarized. “What I’d like to see is try and get some other equipment back out there, at least add this back into the the current year,” Dance said. “I don’t think it’s a bad investment.” If the concrete park is built, then the west side option will account for the steel equipment.

“Well, in good faith, if we have it and if it’s needed, then we should do it right, and then work towards a plan or future funding if that’s what, if that’s what we want that park to turn into,” Carney said, suggesting that the county’s tourism department could investigate whether and how Wadsworth could become a destination park, with events.

Petito will bring back a plan to the commission reflecting the more precise amount of money that can be spent there in 2025, and will work with the tourism bureau on a formal discussion that would land a long-term vision for the skate park on the county’s long-range capital improvement plan.