“LET THIS CITY COME ALIVE AGAIN: LET ITS HEART BEAT AND LET IT BUZZ LIKE IT USED TO!”

Where are all the skateboarders gone and why? Is the city truly dead on a Friday night, and if yes, why? Zoltán Mészáros talked with Balázs Jassek (STÉG Skateboarding) and Péter Farkas (Grand Canyon Pub) in Méz Rádió’s Veszprém-Balaton 2023 broadcast.

“Veszprém is like Hungary on a smaller scale: true, other people make up a larger population, but we are there all over the place,” – thus Péter Farkas expressed the cultural impact of our city. As an example he mentioned that from presenters to audio technicians, any domestic festival will feature people connected to Veszprém.

Interviewees explained that although there is a real buzz in the city during summer festivals, Veszprém seems quite empty and drowsy at other times of the year – a marked change from 10 years ago. Péter Farkas said at that time it was university students who dominated the city’s nightlife, but their numbers have dropped since. Present-day students tend to study really hard, and as a result they come to the city centre and its pubs or bars only once a week  or even less frequently.

Similarly to the vanished evening/night scene, skateboarders are also gone. Balázs  Jassek remembered the good old days in the programme: the  great “Soda-works” area (a skaterboarder zone in the place of a demolished factory). Since that little square gave place to a roundabout, skateboarders have become invisible. Although there is a designated skateboarding track in town, that is more frequented by scooter riders now. He said: in order to get back the everyday spark of the city and regularly see skateboarders again, it would be helpful to have a “gathering spot” for young people and those out for fun. Balázs thinks the theatre gardens could function as a community space for this.

Péter Farkas mentioned: it would be better if Veszprém Arena was situated closer to the city centre, so visitors could go to restaurants, cafés and pubs before and after Arena events. He added:

“If people would like to organise something, that may be loud, colourful, or even offensive to some people, or you might need to work on it next to your daily job, but you must let the creative organiser locals of Veszprém (everyone from secondary school students even to older generations) use the city.”

The Veszprém-Balaton 2023 programme of Méz Rádió is available here: