The Metro Phoenix area has had a couple of different full Pipes to skate. First, there was High Roller Skatepark in the seventies. This was our proving ground, where we got it all down.
Then, about 10 years later, around 1987 the Phoenix Underground Pipe project was built right in Downtown Phoenix. I am not sure why the pipes were there, but it was at the same time they were building a new freeway tunnel, and expanding the hospital, so maybe it was drainage related. I was living right downtown then, so it was very close for me to skate, though access to the big pipe was tricky.
The pipes were about 200 feet underground, initially there was just a big hole and you could walk down, but then they built a huge “barrel” and filled it the dirt all in around it, so the only way in was to climb down a series of scaffolds to the bottom. Once we had to cut some boards away and knock a hole big enough so we could get in there. It was pretty scary, the scaffold was not very sturdy, and it was a long way down. It was dusty and dark, everything had to be hiked in and out.
There was one BIG pipeline, about 20 ft., and who knows how long. I heard they had some kind of boring machine that dug underground, and the pipeline was built in sections as they went. There was also a smaller pipeline, like 14 ft. that intersected with the big pipe forming an “L” shape. I did skate to the end of the smaller pipeline once, it was about 2-3 miles long. I was there one day and they were shooting the “Wheels of Fire” video with Salba, and many of the AZ locals watching, just so awesome to see, do check it out…
AZ Players: Joe Albillar, ScottA, Brian Brannon, Michael Cornelius, Tim Simon, MarK Paz, JoHn Negrelli & the PV CREW, the Ping Bro’s and many others…
Film: I have about 2-3 rolls of film of the Phoenix Underground pipeline, and some video too!
FYI, we’re doing work along 2nd St where pipe tunnel is located. I pulled the 1982 adot as-built plans. It shows bottom of pipe depth at about 60ft rather than 200′. That’s still pretty dam deep from all the underground permitting we’ve done around Phoenix.
I worked on three of these drain tunnels in 1986 to early ’87, from what I remember one tunnel was a long the I-10 freeway before it was built, right about 10th Street to about 7th Avenue, then the next tunnel went somewhere north and south from that location down Central to the river bottom, and the third tunnel was from University Drive to the river bottom, as far as I remember, I may be off a little bit, there was a lot of partying back then in the ’80s. I tied rebar in them working the swing shift. Our quota was to tie 120 ft of rebar every night, then the next crew would come in and put the forms up around the rebar and then the next crew after that would be the crew that poured the concrete, then I would go back in and tie some more rebar, and it would just be a cycle like that .it was a great experience working in the tunnels, to be a part of actually building them, and then to learn about skateboarders going in there and skating the tunnels is pretty cool.
Interesting, you should check out my book. Lots more AZ skateboarding history in there…
I worked in the three drain tunnels tying rebar in 1986 to early ’87, one tunnel went from about 10th Street to 7th Avenue before I-10 was built right along there, then it went down along central ave area to the river bottom, and the third tunnel was from University Drive to the river bottom.