Skaters keen to bowl back

Joanna Davies reports the famous New Lynn Bowl is at last getting a facelift.
If you don't ride a skateboard or live in Hill Cres, chances are you don't know the New Lynn street is home to one of Auckland's oldest skate parks.
The New Lynn Bowl in Bob Hill Reserve is covered in graffiti and the surface is rough after 30 years of use. Homeless people sometimes sleep inside the full pipe but - even in its rundown condition - some skaters still go there.
Over the next month the Waitakere City Council will spend $75,000 to restore the park to its former glory.
Karl Pointon, a former Hill Cres resident, learned to skate at the bowl in the late 1970s and "even went swimming in it in 1978 with my older sisters when it filled up with water after it was first built".
"Looking back, I was quite privileged to have lived across the road from the bowl. There was very little else in the way of decent skate parks in Auckland in the 1980s and early 1990s," he says.
Mr Pointon, 36, still skates at the bowl, and is working with the council to make sure the character of the skate park remains when the upgrade is complete.
"I have been very passionate about the upgrade and, along with the others involved, have been careful to retain the original character of the bowl," he says. "It remains an iconic New Zealand skatepark.
"Cheapskates used to bring out the top professional skaters to New Zealand and on a number of occasions I got to skate with them at the bowl, including Tony Hawk, who is just about a household name for every teenage boy."
Skaters first asked for the park to be restored in 2005, but funds have only just come through.
New Lynn Community Board chairwoman Gayle Marshall says skaters have waited for a long time to see the work begin.
Council spokeswoman Lisah Henry says the council is replacing the footpath at the top of the bowl, as well as making the entry points bigger. "We are also upgrading the basketball half-court, installing new seats and paths and upgrading fencing at the park's entrance," Miss Henry says.
"The skate facility is well used, with skaters travelling from other parts of Auckland. The bowl shape is not common in the region and is popular with more experienced skaters."