Growing up in West Oakland isn’t easy. Right across the bay from shiny San Francisco, the struggling city is riddled with gangs and has one of the highest homicide and robbery rates in the country. It’d be easy for the skateboarding scene to die off, or not exist at all, under such difficult circumstances, but Keith “K-Dub” Williams is making sure that doesn’t happen.
In 2008, the full-time art teacher decided to take matters into his own hands and approached the city to open up a skatepark right in the heart of West Oakland. With no funding to speak of, K-Dub built ramps out of found wood and funded other materials out of his own pocket while encouraging local skaters to get involved to help build the park up completely from scratch.
The park solidified itself in 2014 when Levi’s Skateboarding partnered up with K-Dub and upgraded the park from old, repurposed wood to full concrete. For our newest installment of Locals, we talked with K-Dub, a founding father of West Oakland’s skate scene and the lead organizer of Town Park as it continues it’s second phase of construction.
Comments
Popular
-
DOES SIZE MATTER?
I hit up physical therapist Dr. Kyle Brown for some insight on whether or not our height plays a noticeable role in how we skate.
-
A FIRST LOOK AT OPERA AND SKATEBOARDING’S NEWEST GROUP OF BRANDS
Bill Weiss and a few of his close friends are picking up the pieces from the Dwindle rubble and starting fresh with a new slew of brands.
-
HOW CHAD CARUSO SKATED ACROSS AMERICA
Chad did it the way most skateboarders would: independently and without much of a plan.
-
PREMIERE: VIVIEN FEIL AND SOY PANDAY IN MAGENTA’S “JUST CRUISE II”
We hope to skate half as good as these dudes when we are in our 40s.
-
WHAT HAPPENED TO GERSHON MOSLEY?
From punching Andrew Reynolds, to not getting "pimped" by the industry, Gershon covers everything you wanted to know.
June 18, 2015 4:20 pm
Kdub is a BOSS.
Great work everyone all around on this 1.
June 19, 2015 12:06 am
Yeah, KDub seems like a great guy. That’s really cool that he spearheaded that movement and got stuff done. Good story, Jenkem.
June 19, 2015 1:16 am
Great job KDub
June 20, 2015 5:32 pm
he rules