The Vigorous North, a “Field Guide to Inner-City Wilderness Areas,” has this great thing up right now about another wonderful side effect of the current economic slowdown. From The Foreclosed Backyards National [Skate] Park:

… thanks to the passage of the massive bailout package and the “troubled asset relief program,” the American public now owns a substantial portion of these over-mortgaged backyards.

America’s foreclosed backyards are a lot like a newly-created national park.

It’s a good survey of recent articles from the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, focusing in particular on how drained swimming pools are such a wonderful resource for those with skateboards and a few cleaning supplies.

The skateboarders have even developed their own code of ethics, which is strikingly similar to the “leave no trace” principles that are promoted among backcountry hikers and climbers.

This is of course quite similar to the water shortages of the ’70s that drained so many Southern CA backyard pools, inadvertently helping birth the era of modern skateboarding. Yet another way to survive the coming economic depression in high style.