Micromobility, the use of bikes, electric scooters, skateboards, Segways, wheelchairs and many other such small, lightweight vehicles for transportation, couldn’t be better exemplified than in the use of skates for getting from one place to another. And I believe a great example of this subsector of mobility just might be found in BYU undergraduate Kate Fowler… Kate can skate!
One afternoon I happened to observe a pair of well worn rollerblades (inline skates) flung under a dining table at Enliten Bakery & Cafe and thought there might be a story to spin from those orangish and one-strangely-black wheels. The skates, it turned out, belonged to Kate Fowler, a senior this year who is majoring in Editing and Publishing at none other than nearby Brigham Young University and after inquiring, we agreed to an interview for a BikeWalk Provo Story at the Harold B. Lee Library on BYU’s main campus.
Kate grew up in Draper, Utah and is now living in the Joaquin Neighborhood of Provo where for three years, she’s been effortlessly gliding through its picturesque, tree lined streets for fun and for transport to wherever she needs to be. At an early age of four, Kate started skating, and inline skating at the age of ten with her “brother’s old pair of skates, stole them out of the garage,” she tells me with an impish smile. She would often skate to neighborhood parks and over to friends’ houses and sometimes along stretches of the Jordan River Parkway (the longest paved urban trail in the United States, with over 60 miles following the Jordan River).
Before our interview, I had to get permission from the University Librarian to take the photo of Kate with her skates on at the top of the stairs in the atrium, but it took no effort convincing Kate to pose for the shot near the edge of the steps. Sporting a pair of K2 Alexis 80 Pro - Black/Teal inlines, Kate tells me she feels, and it appears to me, comfortable and in total control on eight wheels. Someone walks by on their way out of the library carrying a pair of rollerblades.
Kate often enjoys “skating to a cafe or a friend’s house… [I’ll] show up at friends’ houses on rollerblades and friends are shocked,” she laughs. “If a friend calls to meet at a cafe, only nine blocks away, I’ll skate… shortens the distance.” Kate says she also likes “skating around the Rec Center because the sidewalks are really nice, the sidewalks are terrible in Provo,” and “the Murdock Canal Trail at Palisades Park,” as well as “skating from University Avenue to 900 East, zigzagging through the Joaquin Neighborhood, and to Memorial Park… After being in my apartment or on campus all day, it’s really nice to get out in the fresh air.”
“I’m a firm believer in finding exercise that I enjoy,” Kate emphasizes, and she wishes that “more people rollerbladed” for that reason and others. As for dealing with traffic on the streets in our car-centric Provo, “cars can be pretty good about it, but they misjudge my speed.” Another minor consideration that Kate wants to mention is that “restaurants have rules that you have to take them [skates] off.”
Finally, I ask Kate to sum up her feelings about inline skating: “Liberating, nice to feel in control… my life may feel out of control, but I can be in control while rollerblading.” Oh, and that single black wheel on Kate’s skates… it’s a replacement like those of two other sets of wheels that Kate has worn out.
