(upbeat jazz music) - [Ty] Yo, what's up?

This is Ty from Ransom Skateboarding BMX Events, here with Dave Peterson.

(person cheering) We're doing big things out here in the Downtown Thursdays, out here in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

(skateboard clatters) (upbeat hip hop music) (skateboard clatters) (upbeat hip hop music) (skateboard clatters) (upbeat hip hop music) - Skating in Downtown in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

A lot of people having fun, there's a lot of people here, and they're having a good time.

(upbeat hip hop music) (dramatic instrumental music) (dramatic instrumental music continues) - Despite being Connecticut's largest city, more than 20% of the population of Bridgeport lives below the poverty line.

That's more than double the entire state's poverty rate and higher than the national average of 12.3%.

I've lived here all my life.

I've experienced local government ignoring the community's needs, and I hear other towns calling us the ghetto stain on Connecticut.

(dog barks) I also know how much life the city has.

When I was a kid, Bridgeport's skateboarding community was huge and growing.

Now, it's all gone.

(dramatic electronic music) (train tracks shuttering) We are here at the old Rampage skate shop, and seeing like the inside, and being all empty.

(wind blowing) I don't know, it's kinda making me emotional because like, this used to be something so important, and Bridgeport got nothing.

And it used to have something.

It used to have something, and now it's gone.

Now it's this, you know?

Just something that I could have had, something that my little sister could have had.

(wind blowing) This place, I feel like I could still feel it.

You could still feel it.

(wind blowing) Now it's all empty and dirty.

To find out what happened I needed to start with Bridgeport's most popular skate shop at the time, Rampage.

(upbeat hip hop music) - My name is David Peterson, I'm the owner of Rampage Skate Shop and skate park equipment, and we build skateboard ramps.

We got the building on Railroad Ave. in October 27th, 2002.

Like a year or two later, I put in like a mini ramp outside and then in 2010 I opened up a little skate shop, and the kids would just come by and hang out and skate every day.

(upbeat rock music) (person cheering) (unintelligible) - [David] Yeah, and then we got into doing like concerts and events like graffiti jams, break dancing competitions, all types of parties.

- [Announcer] What?

(people cheering) - [David] Yeah, and like every day there was anywhere from like 15 to 50 people hanging out skating (people applauding) or just hanging out or whatever.

It was just like a community spot.

(person sighs) - [Agustina] So what happened?

Why is it all gone?

- Why did we leave?

It was a combination of things.

This was right when Ganim got in, he had the sign, "Don't raise taxes!"

All of a sudden I look at my tax bills, noticed 3000 on top.

Makes it so hard, it's the highest mill rate in the country.

Yeah, it's just expensive.

Like, this space I'm renting now is cheaper than the taxes alone, you know?

(machinery clattering) - What you at?

We here at Rampage, you feel me?

Getting here, getting cut, you feel me?

(upbeat hip hop music) Everybody's doing their thing.

Don't give a (bleep) where it's at.

- [David] Like, so when I first opened up the shop, there was all these kids in between the ages of 12 to 16, and there was a lot of them.

And then that wave of kids, like the ones behind them, it wasn't that much.

It was definitely a little less.

(melancholy instrumental music) - I needed to understand why kids stopped skating.

So, I got in touch with my good friend Brian, a skater that experienced the peak and watched it die.

So you're a skater?

(person chuckles) Yeah.

Why don't you talk to me about your skating experience.

- So she couldn't find anything.

(skateboard clattering) Okay.

I'm kind of like, this actually really brings a lot of memories back.

This is the first one.

(skateboard clatters) Shit.

- [Agustina] It doesn't even look like a board.

- This one?

Yeah, this was a Walmart board.

(motor running) This one I got like, I think I got this at Savers.

- [Agustina] Neff, ha!

- Either Savers or a tag sale.

- [Agustina] That's crazy.

Oh my god.

- [Brian] There was a peak.

- [Agustina] Mhm.

- [Brian] Definitely was a peak.

- [Agustina] Do you know like, what would you say was the timeframe of that peak?

- For like when I started skating it was like 20, I think 2014, 2015.

But it's so weird because that peak was so like small.

I noticed definitely there was not a lot of kids skating no more, which kind of sucked for me, because I always like seeing kids skate.

I don't know, I just like always think in my head like, "That used to be me as a kid."

So there's not, it's really hard in Bridgeport, because like there's not a lot of skate places.

Once you start getting towards Downtown where like a lot of corporations are, there'll be like signs where it says, "Do not skate," and those places had the flattest like ground.

Like the areas that people are not gonna use (wheels clattering) and they just put a, "Do not skate," sign in.

The people that wanted to skate went to Seaside first.

(upbeat hip hop music) ♪ Make it drop like this ♪ ♪ Make it drop like this ♪ (seagulls screeching) - [Agustina] Seaside is the city's long beach stretch, local hotspot, and home to Bridgeport's oldest skate park, until around 2015 when the park was permanently removed.

- And once that was taken down it felt like they took away like all the roots.

Kids wanted to skate, kids wanted to be, get into it and not pay.

You shouldn't have to pay, but like the only free place that you could do it is gone now.

- All the research that I did about the skate park shutdowns in Bridgeport, honestly it doesn't make any sense.

There was a public forum that said they took it down, because it was in deteriorating condition.

- The ramps that they built were made to last.

Like they're solid ramps.

Like the worst thing that happens to them is that they, they dip into the asphalt too much, and then you'll get like a lip from the ramp where the asphalt is, but even that takes like 10, 15 years to do.

So like, what, if it's nothing now, what was the point of getting rid of it?

- They were changing the city for people who didn't live here, I could already see that.

(train tracks clattering) Taking away what the community was using in favor of new fancy developments, it was a business move.

But there's not this master plan to get rid of us.

(dramatic instrumental music) We just tend to be collateral damage.

(skateboard clattering) - [Brian] It never got to its fullest potential in the skating aspect.

(dramatic instrumental music) - [Agustina] I don't think the people who are fighting, I don't think they're scared, (dramatic instrumental music) but I do think they're tired, because this is not the only fight that they're fighting.

I want people to, I definitely want people to recognize Bridgeport as an actual city where actual people live, who are actually doing things, you know, beautiful, creative things, you know.

(skateboard clattering) After all the searching from the last standing skate bowl of Rampage, to the rusty dents of Seaside, I still haven't gotten a solid answer about what happened, but this is just the beginning, because we are still here.

(dramatic instrumental music)