Skateboarding is one of those urban activities which we are used to seeing now. Indeed, it can be a welcome sight, given that it is at least one of the pastimes which involves young people actually getting outside and doing some exercise.

But there is a time and a place for everything, and skateboarding seems to have become something of a nuisance for some people in Bradford city centre, with skateboarders practising their hobby in busy areas such as Centenary Square and the main shopping thoroughfares.

As tempting as these areas might seem, with their flat expanses and interesting steps and obstacles, they are just not the right locations to carry out skateboarding practice.

The skateboarders can’t really complain about the lack of existing facilities, as the Telegraph & Argus has reported many times on the installation of skate parks around the district, usually at not insignificant cost to the taxpayer.

These facilities are purpose-designed – often with the input of the skating community – so should provide ample practice potential for those who enjoy skateboarding. The danger is that if they are eschewed by the people they have been built for then there might be calls for them to be torn down and replaced with facilities for more people to enjoy.

So the skateboarders should abandon the city centre – and the risk that they are going to run into a pedestrian and perhaps cause serious injury– and make full use of the skate parks they have been given.

Otherwise they might find they are getting on the wrong side of the law purely for carrying out their favourite hobby, and no-one wants to get to a situation like that.