Colorado Springs skateboarders are left with one fewer place to challenge their skills after the city demolished the large wooden skate ramp in Memorial Park on Monday.

The 14-foot-tall vertical ramp and the smaller, adjacent vertical ramp were installed in 2012 through a partnership between the city and a nonprofit called Sk8-Strong. The additions were spearheaded by Jonathan Schwan, a teenage skateboarder and X Games participant from Colorado Springs, who helped raise more than $60,000 to bring in the new features.

The ramps were purchased from an indoor skate park and installed on a concrete pad in the park. An agreement between the city Parks, Recreation & Cultural Services Department and Sk8-Strong put the nonprofit in charge of maintaining the ramp for its first decade of use.

“I remember the opening day,” one Colorado Springs resident, Alexandra Domitrovich, said on Facebook. “Sad to see the legend die. So many skaters back when it opened, talented ones too flocked to that behemoth.”

The loss of the ramp elicited numerous reactions of disappointment on social media.

Parks operations manager Eric Becker said that because the ramps came from an indoor park, they weren’t designed to withstand Colorado weather. Standing water that gathered at the base of the ramps after rainstorms ate away at the wood. The particular curve of the wooden surfaces were challenging to replace when they were damaged.

Last fall, the city decommissioned the vertical ramp in preparation for it to be taken down, though local skaters said they still found ways to use it. The smaller ramp received a $60,000 renovation. Becker said the secondary ramp felt like a smart use of the city’s limited funds because it was more widely used than the taller ramp.

“Very few skaters could even use that feature, at least in the proper way,” Becker said. “We’d get a lot of people using it in different capacities, but the actual ramp is largely made for semi-pro skaters.”

Dale Bonnell has been skating since he was in sixth grade and lived in Colorado Springs since 2015. Bonnell started a small business DB Skate Designs that recycles old skateboards into jewelry or uses them to make new, custom boards.

Bonnell said that vertical ramps like that were uncommon to see in cities because they required a different skill set than street-level skating. While he hadn’t regularly used the ramp, Bonnell said it had been part of what made Memorial Park a draw for skaters.

“It’s a good park for the skate community and it’s the only one that has almost everything a kid would need to try and become something better and grow within the sport,” Bonnell said.

Skateboarders in Memorial Park on Tuesday said they hoped the city would add more features to replace the ramp. Some wanted to see a similar vertical ramp, which doesn’t exist in any of Colorado Springs’ other public parks. The largest other skate park is in Goose Gossage Park.

Others, including Bonnell, wanted to see more obstacles and learning areas added to help train new skateboarders. Bonnell said a larger investment from the city in the skateboard scene would fit with the city’s Olympic spirit and support of outdoor sports.

Becker said there haven’t been many discussion about what to replace the ramp with. city was identifying groups that could help fundraise for it.

“Funding is the biggest challenge we have. Most likely, a public process would probably happen to engage the community about the best use of the spot,” Becker said.

The parks department is facing a nearly $2 million budget reduction this year from the city’s general fund. The skate ramp was decommissioned months before the wave of reductions Parks leaders announced last week as part of the budget cuts.