And so the debate, and the lack of a high-standard outdoor skatepark, rumbled (and rumbles) on. Ken, who I meet first at Transgression Park, had been involved early on - lobbying and drawing up business plans and feasibility studies which, in the end, seem to have been studiously ignored. There are only so many knock-backs that can be taken in the face of staunch apathy, and virtually all hope had been given up.

In the meantime other Scottish cities grasped the nettle with Dundee, Aberdeen, Glasgow and, erm, Cumbernauld all leaping ahead of the more conservative capital.

Dougie, on the other hand, is not a BMXer. And he's not a skateboarder. And I'm confused as to how he got involved with the scheme.

An office-based worker with a keen sense of there being something more to life, and actually wanting to make sure he got that something more, he started training as a stuntman. I thought this was just the type of thing you saw on the tv, but there I was with a real-life stuntman who had just handed in his office job notice as these new plans took hold.

The only problem Dougie had with training for his most alternative of careers was a lack of anywhere that was willing to let him train, with gym owners and the like being ultimately reticent when it came to members throwing themselves about with wild abandon. It was then that he hit on the idea of having his own particular space, which he could offer to other people to use, and which belonging to him, no-one could stop him training.

The exact nature of that personal space, however, was unclear, until, through the power of the local newspaper Ken found out about Dougie's plight, made available all the research he had done on BMX and skateparks and planted the seed. Within a month the two of them had gone into business, setting up EHX, a company specialising in urban and extreme sports, and with a vague plan of where to go forward.

This was February 2007 and things moved quickly from there with EHX getting involved in a number of extreme sports events, setting up 'villages' for demonstrations and where people could try things out. From the Rat Race urban adventure race in Edinburgh, to Gaelforce West, EHX set about building up a brand, and above all some money for the grand scheme.

And it very almost wasn't in the room I'm standing in. They were literally moments away from signing up for a space on an industrial site when an epiphany struck both the guys, and the people at Ocean Terminal. They had hosted a one week temporary event in this very room, but why not make it permanent, and have the park at a site with good transport links, and somewhere which opens up all sorts of other business opportunities?