Cowboys Park Skatepark (formerly Shaw Millennium Park)

Canada's largest outdoor skatepark — 75,000 square feet of concrete on the west edge of downtown, open since 2000. It is split into beginner, intermediate and advanced sections, so the shallow bowl, small four-stair and hubba sit well away from the clover bowl and the full pipe.

The scale is the thing: with this much concrete the sections genuinely are separate, so you can spend a whole session in the beginner area — shallow bowl, bathtub bowl, a four-set with a hubba and rail — without anyone hurrying you towards the clover bowl or the full pipe. Lights keep it usable after dark and the skatepark itself never closes.

Two things to plan around. The park was renamed from Shaw Millennium Park to Cowboys Park and it doubles as Calgary’s main festival ground, so from mid-July parts of the park close around events; the city’s page lists what is open week to week. Parking is the pay lot beside Mewata off 11th Street, then a short roll across the park past the fountain.