Mini-Ramp Madness

 Mini-Ramp Madness

The long overdue follow-up to Ontario's Best Bowls, I present a compilation of Mini-ramps, Vert and Pockets. Some are great, some are no more than two parallel quarter pipes. Click on the name/link for locations & reviews of the park. I left out some truly awful ramps & places I haven't been to yet but you can check out the full directory of 560+ parks and 1000+ point map HERE.

Updated as of Aug 2025.

Ajax - Ajax Community Centre

Alvinston

Aamjiwnaang - Sarnia

Akwesasne Skatepark - Cornwall Island

Amherstburg

There's also a 4' mini on the open pad

Angus

Arthur

Arnprior

Beeton

Binbrook

Bonfield

Pretty good for a seasonal park

Bradford

Brampton

Brampton has a couple minis and a bowled-out pocket.

Brantford

Brant's Crossing has an interesting, street inspired mini and there's a metal ramp on the other end of the city.

Brighton

Brighton's update included a bowl section that flows into the park.

Caesarea

Chesley 2.0

CJ's Skatepark - Mississauga

Not too many places to find a small mini, large mini & vert ramp but CJ's has them all.

Collingwood

Cornwall

Corunna

Elora

Erin

Fergus

Forest

Frankford

Georgetown

Driveway Skate Shop has a nice indoor Mini and the mini-bowl at Gellert is very popular.

Gravenhurst

Goderich

Guelph - Silvercreek Skatepark

Haliburton

Hamilton

Every park has a mini, bowl or quarter.

Ilderton

Sweet little flow park.

Inner Circle Skatepark

Innisfil - Sleeping Lion Skatepark

Kemptville

Kingston

Kingston has 3 parks with a lot of transition but Polson has the true mini.

Kingsville

Kitchener - Upper Canada Skatepark

Lakefield

Listowell

London

London has some great bowls. This mini is at Kiwanis. There is a mini at West Lions with some plans for pre-fab.

Lucan

Lucknow

Not that good. The Mini is tranny to bank with no-ping.

Lynhurst

Flowy little park

Madoc

Central Hastings Skatepark

Markham

Greensborough-Williamson Neighbourhood Park is the best mini but Berczy can be fun too.

Mississauga

Crappy minis at Port Credit & Malton(currently closed). Zonta Meadows Flow Park opens in 2026 and CJ's is in Mississauga.

Mitchell

Mt Forest

Crappy mini and crappier 'bowl'

Muskoka Woods

Private summer camp. I've dropped in. Not recommended. Now Decommissioned. 

Newmarket

Niagara Falls

North Bay

Thompson Park

Oakville

Shell Park Whale Bowl (above), Iroquois Ridge Skatepark, William Rose Bowl, Cornwall Rd Skate Spot and 16 Mile have all the transition covered.

Oil Springs

Orillia

Souldiers Orillia's mini. RIP.  There's another 'mini' at the outdoor. It's on the 'worst bowls' list.

Ottawa

Ottawa and the surrounding area have a lot of good parks. Legacy, Kanata & Berrigan have a lot transition. On Deck Skateboard Shop has its own mini-ramp! Stefan Wenek saved the pre-fab mini with the park upgrade.

Owen Sound

Weird Park. Metal Mini that's been upgraded to a half bowl but downgraded due to a hole in the ramp

Paris

Paris now has a great phase 2 bowl.

Parkhill

Phelam

Interesting park with a snake-run mini.

Pembroke

Pocket and mini

Peterborough

Big, old and gnarly

Picton

Possibly the worlds best mini-bowl.

Plattsville

Port Colborne

Port Hope

Port Rowan

Port Perry

Rama

Rama has some parallel walls if you're desperate.

Richmond Hill

Giant mini at Richmond Green for now. Amazing bowl at Lake Wilcox.

Ripley

Rockwood

Rossmore Ramp

Hidden gem in the middle of no where.

Saugeen Shores

Shallow Lake

Shelburne

Stoney Point, Lakeshore

St Thomas

This shot does not do this park justice. Click the link.

Stratford

Stratford All-wheels park. Phase 1.

Sudbury

Greater Sudbury has a bunch of parks, some of them are terrible. Some have mini's. 

This is Delki Dozzi Park. 

Tecumseh

Temagami

Thornbury

Grab some Cider

Trenton

Quinte West Skatepark

Tillsonburg

Toronto Bowls & Mini-ramps

For all of the Toronto Skateparks click HERE

Vaughan

Vaughan has some strange 'minis' at Carville Mill & Village Green 

but the best is the 12 oaks mini-bowl.

Washago

Whitby

McKinney has a nice mini even though I broke my collar bone there. Recent patches are less than stellar. Whitby Sports Centre will have a skatepark with bowl & pump track.

Woodstock

I had to throw in this crazy flow section.

Pickering Indoor Skatepark

 Pickering Indoor Skatepark

UPDATE - Follow the Pickering Mobile Skate Park on the cities website. 2025 plans not yet announced.

The park is now mobile and sets up as needed in Pickering.  

The Pickering Indoor Skatepark is open but there are a bunch of restrictions based on the current Covid situation and city policies.

The park will be Free for the first month but have a small user fee after. This is to curb people from signing up for a session and not showing up. 

Click HERE for info on the Park, Sessions, Hours & More

Click Here for Registration. Search 'Skateboarding'

DON'T SHOOT THE MESSENGER. 

Please Read Everything!

1. Sign-ups for the first week will be restricted to City of Pickering Residents ONLY with open registrations starting March 5th for sessions after that date.

2. Please don't sign up if your in a lockdown/Grey area or should be quarantining. The system will not allow sign-ups from locked down zones.

3. Don't sign up for more than one session a day. This is due to a Ministry of Health policy that restricts the amount of indoor amateur sport activity. Staff will not allow you to skate in 2 sessions and you've blocked a spot someone else could use.

4. The system is currently set-up for 2 sessions, Max of 10 people per session on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday. More sessions and days can be added as demand dictates. 

5. Helmets and Masks are mandatory. Bring your own.

6. Park is open to Skateboards, Roller/Inline Skates & Scooters only at this time. The park is not yet equipped to handle BMX. 

7. No spectators allowed at this time. 

8. If you want to move something, just ask and put it back when you're done. The park has been laid out to promote social distancing and provide the best experience possible. 

9. Everything is subject to change. I don't control the city. I don't control Covid. I can't get you in early. I have to sign up like everyone else. 

10. You must register in advance on Pickering.ca/active or click HERE for your session. Search 'skateboard' or 'skateboarding' and choose a session. If you don't have an account, creating one takes less than 5mins. 

We are so blessed to have an indoor spot.

We have City Staff on our side. (Thank you Jordan et.al.)

More obstacles are planned. 

Have fun.

Tag your clips with #pickeringindoorskatepark

Additional questions should be directed to Jordan Cahill (jcahill@pickering.ca)

The Pickering Indoor Skatepark is located in the O'brien Arena @ Chestnut Hill Developments Recreation Complex (Formerly Pickering Rec Complex), 1867 Valley Farm Rd. Enter at the Rear of the building off the back parking lot, directly into the O'brien Arena until March 25. As of March 27, the park be will moved to Don Beer Arena, 940 Dillingham Rd.

No Mongo Podcast

 

Yesterday I got to sit down and Zoom with Rick Bata of the NO Mongo Podcast. (Mongo being the style of pushing your skateboard with your front foot while the back foot remains on the board) We chatted about skatepark advocacy, adventures and more. Check it out when it drops on Tuesday February 16th on all the usual platforms. NoMongo.com

We worked through some connectivity issues but rolled away clean.

We Helped Newcastle!

 We Helped Newcastle!

(FYI - Park is Done! Check it out HERE)

Now let's do it again.

UPDATE - We did it again. Update at the bottom.

The Municipality of Clarington heard our concerns about the pre-fab metal skatepark concepts they had released in May of 2020. I sent an open letter pointing out some of the issues with these types of parks. Read it HERE.

According to the municipality, Newcastle will now have a cast-in-place skatepark. The change to concrete from a pre-fabricated metal park was due to overwhelming public feedback. Check out the Durham Post article HERE.  A design has been released and a survey has been included to receive feedback. 

Click HERE for the Newcastle Community Park Project Page

EDIT*** - This is a place holder design. A really good skatepark company has been awarded the design/build contract and will adjust the design based on survey feedback. The place holder Skatepark Photo led to my confusion. 

There is a few things I will point out regarding this design and its survey. Note- this is my opinion based on experience and may not be fact or what the local users desire out of their skatepark. I have also been contacted and this project is in good hands.

1) It lacks basics. There's no flat rail, no flat ledge and no manny pad. These should be the first obstacles considered in any skatepark design. EDIT* - The city has added to the survey and it asks about the importance of obstacles to the user. 

2) There are 2 rollers. This is a waste of space and materials. At minimum, one should be a bank-flat-bank with a rail. The survey calls this a table top.

3) The design looks like a pre-cast skatepark. The difference here is a pre-cast park is built off site and shipped. The obstacles are arranged on site but there are always issues with gaps and edges not meeting cleanly.  

 

Pre-cast skatepark issues.

A Cast-in-place (or Poured-in-place aka PIP) Skatepark is completely formed of site. Experienced build crews can work with a pre-cast design and make it great but starting with a great design will create a better park. The elevated bowl in this design looks out of place.

Pre-cast Design

Cast in Place Design

Final Result in Beamsville

4) There is a question in the survey about landscaping. Over the summer, a Markham Local contacted the city about the woodchips that were getting into the park from the landscaping at the edge of the park. The woodchips were removed and the city said sod would be added later. New trees planted just off the park are great provided they don't shed acorns or maple keys onto the park. Woodchips, mulch, pea gravel, soil and other substrates should be kept far from the park to prevent them draining onto the park. 

Many parks have filled their planters in to prevent run-off issues.

5) There's just something unsettling about this whole project. The first person I had been in contact with retired and by the time I reached his replacement, they informed me that they were in the process of awarding the design build project to the successful company. The park looks a little smaller than Gellert in Georgetown (population ~45000). Of course this is difficult to tell as the design had no dimensions of any kind. Is it a 1" bowl? Is it a 12" bowl? Newcastle has a population of around 10000 (as per stats Can.). Based on stats from Skaters for Public Skateparks, Newcastle doesn't need this much square footage. Should they get a big park? Yes. But a better designed and cost effective park.   I have also heard from a source that the build crew knows their building this park next year.  EDIT* - I'm less worried about this now that I know who's involved.

I'm excited for Newcastle. It's close enough for me to be a regularly skated park and I have friends with kids who are looking forward to having a skatepark. 

Update

Nearly 300 people responded to the survey and the updated design is now out with an additional feedback form for last minuet adjustments.

Link to the project page and feedback form can be found HERE.

 

Goodbye & Good Riddance 2020

 Goodbye & Good Riddance 2020

2020, for the most part, was not the year a lot of people had planned on. My plans included road trips with the Dirty Jags and Skatosis guys. While I didn't make it to Wisconsin, I was able to meet up with Kurt of the Dirty Jags in Picton for a skate. On top of that, I hit 26 new Skateparks, including my 400th park. I got some advocacy done in Pickering and sent some useful info to Clarington which may have convinced them to go concrete instead of pre-fabricated (Check it out HERE). My map was picked up by Canada Skateboard (the Olympic Body, but now they aren't returning my e-mails so IDK). 

I was honoured to be a guest on The Goat Cave Podcast and later in the year, went out on a little road trip with Cam.

I hit my 400th Skatepark but it was not without some frustration with the city - Check it HERE

With some help from my buddy, Chris J. Brown, I made a Halloween video. I took on the look and tricks of one of my favourite skaters, The Featch, Mr Richie Jackson.

Lastly, one of the things that has kept me busy and sane was building skate obstacles for friends and myself. I had a second run of building this fall for the basement ramps, anticipating another lockdown.

I'm thankful to be back at work (Paramedic in a heavily Covid infected area) after the Clavicle fracture from last year. Thankful my family is safe and healthy, pissed at idiots who think this is a joke & my heart goes out to anyone who has lost someone and this is their first Christmas or holiday season without their loved one. 

Wear a mask. Get ready to roll up your sleeve. 

Spread Love, Not Germs.

Merry Christmas and Have a Happy NEW Year from The Loonies.

Emphasis on NEW!

Knifeside DIY. Somewhere in Niagara Region

 Knifeside DIY

Somewhere in Niagara Region

Petition

DIY's Rule! But DIY rules prevent me from revealing the location. I was invited to Knifeside by a local friend we'd met up with at the Virgil Skatepark. 

Oh look, another tree!

Imma jump outta it!

 

(Full disclosure - I don't know if THIS was a make. You'll have to check out the Alex's Video when it comes out.)

Niagara-on-the-Lake Skatepark. Virgil, ON

 Niagara-on-the-Lake Skatepark

Virgil, ON

1565 Four Mile Road

It wasn't without some challenges (See Here) but the new skatepark in Virgil, ON is open and it is awesome. There are some easy ledges and small quarter pipes but there's definitely some gnar here too.

This extension is ~6ft tall with a lot of vert and topped with pool coping. I didn't figure it out but the locals were ripping it.

There I go, climbing trees again.

 Kudos to Pro-pour Concrete Services on another great park.