Perhaps girls need to break a few things in town for their needs to be recognized.  That said, sports fields are equal-opportunity, if not equally used by boys and girls.

Yep.

As long as they're not barring girls from using the facilities I see nothing wrong with them building what they did.

Two of my nieces are involved in what some might consider to be "boy's sports." One is a kayaker, and the other is at a very high level in taekwondo.

Things sure have changed for the better from when I was a lad and wanted to play ringette.

Chansen - in theory sports fields should be equal opportunity.  I have a feeling that if an inexperienced ten year old girl showed up at our skate board park and wanted to try some of the slopes or jumps or obstacles she would not be welcomed.  In fact, she just might get crowded out or laughed at.  

I have a feeling that girls might make better use of a water park - but they are few and far between in this city.  Recently a new middle school was opened in the area - no pool.  Also a huge (for this area) sports complex is being developed.  Two hockey rinks, foot ball field, etc.   No swimming pool or water park.   I suppose the walking track around the hockey rinks might appeal to some. 

It's a good question seeler.

Girls (and women's) hockey is a thriving & growing sport in the area where I live.  The girls leagues have been quite vocal & active about gaining ice-time in a more equitable formula.  On the other hand, I think boys/men are under-represented in figure skating.  In speed-skating, it's about equal I think.

I think our local soccer leagues are also well populated with girls teams, and a woman colleague of mine plays on an adult women's soccer team.  Don't know if they have any issues with booking fields.

Football?  Well, Toronto will soon be home to a Lingerie League team (I kid you not - that's the name) ... sexist in the extreme I think ...   somewhat up there with Beach Volleyball regarding the 'uniforms' worn to compete.

My son is a "skater" - I don't get a sexist vibe from those kids & I have seen girls at our local skateparks - but again it's mostly boys I think. 

Do you think parents steer their girls AWAY from the more physically active, potentially risky or injurious activities?  Or do you think it's a natural preference?

Some women do mountain-bike (I've seen some with their body armour on in Whistler Village!) but it does seem more of guy thing, if I judge by the folks I've seen there.

I find it depends on the community.

Where I live, hockey is huge, There are both men's and women's teams.

The high school has a boys' and a girls' hockey team.

One day both teams played, and the boys' team lost whereas the girls' team won. The story of the boys' team losing made the front page of the local newspaper, while the story of the girls' team winning made the back page. That's the bias of the media, not the school.

Some communities make a great effort to run the same activities for both, but other communities still have "male activities" (competitive sports) and 'female activities" (individualized fitness programs and classes.)

I would love to see the age of co-ed sports only. (And separate locker rooms, of course.)

We have co-ed police forces and co-ed firefighting forces now.

A generation ago, people objected to this because they thought good policing and good firefighting was about brute physical strength, which men will always have more of than women. But good policing and good firefighting is about teamwork, cooperation, and strategy far more than they are about brute strength.

I think the same is true of competitive sports. These sports are far more about teamwork and strategy. In my opinion, the time has come to do away with separate teams and just go with one co-ed team.

It would save a lot of money, anyway. Imagine: no more Olympic men's hockey team and Olympic women's hockey team. Just one co-ed team from each country playing in one league. (And soccer, and curling, etc., etc.)

That's more a case of attitudes than distribution of resources.  I don't see that attitude in skiing, or mountain biking.  I am not a skateboarder.  Overall, I see young men being a lot better at being encouraging to n00bz (girls and boys) than they were in my youth.

There's an oversight.  Pools are notoriously expensive to run, so while I understand why municipalities build rec centres without them, this is a valid point about girl-centric athletics taking a back seat.

That said, dance studios are more common now, and it's not sexist to observe that those are mostly use by girls.

The name of the game Golf was originally an acronym for 

"Gentlemen Only,  Ladies Forbidden."  

I am glad we have moved past that.

Not in Augusta.  Golf certainly has a bit of a chequered past.

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I see lots of girls using bike parks and skate boarding and I have found that boys are pretty keen to indoctrinate them to the thrills.

Are girls interested?  Maybe not but that isn't anyones problems.

With some well known athletic females like Jennifer Heil doing some pretty agreesive sports i think that girls take a second look at some sports

Here in Vancouver I see things like outdoor volleyball and rollerblading being enjoyed by all at the beach/ park.

I am not a competitive sports person, due in large part to physical limitations, but I had friends growing up, girls who were into skateboarding and snowboarding, rugged mountain-biking, surfing, windsurfing. I think they really had to prove themselves to be "one of the boys" to be accepted in those circles...but the geographical location lends itself to those sports, so I can see why they wanted to do it...in those days, they were called by names like skate Betty(s) or Surf Betty(s). Boys used those names as derrogatory and made up all kinds of rumours about `those girls`...eventually, the girls claimed the names for themselves, and they became sort of a badge of honour. I`m not sure if they`re still in use..it`s been over 20 yrs. Now, in places like Whistler or Tofino, I think those sports have become pretty equal opportunity.

Speaking of dance, my friend (girl) won a youth breakdancing competition at age 12 or 13...a competiton of both boys and girls. It`s made a comeback. I`ve seen young men and women. college age, practicing in a downtown square in the summer for the last few years.

I guess I'm showing my age.  

Of course in the small settlement where I grew up girls played pick-up softball and sometimes hockey on an outdoor stretch of ice.   We were needed to have sufficient numbers to divide into two teams.  

But when we reached high school and were bused out to a regional school in the village, we discovered that girls and boys activities were completely separate, and that boys got more gym time (noon hour and after school) than girls, and a teacher was hired to teach boys gym and coach the boys teams but girls gym was taught? by a regular teacher who had no interest or ability.   The girls basketball team was coached by the boys coach as an afterthought.  

The situation hadn't improved much when I was raising my children in the 1960s and early '70s.  

I'm glad to hear that things are different now.  

Maybe the radio personality talking about the new dirt bike park doesn't understand today's world either.  He kept talking about how good it would be for the boys, how it would get the boys away from computer games, how it would keep the boys from getting into trouble, and how the boys would be provided with shovels and rakes to keep the trails in shape.    Or maybe he thought 'boys' is a generic term.    He just ruffled my feathers a little.

When I was growing up I went to the public ice skating every Sunday afternoon, public roller skating at least 3 times a week, toboganning, fishing, public swimming at the local lyons pool, etc......BUT the one thing I really felt left out in was the local pool hall. NO "decent" girl would be caught dead in that place, thank god that has all changed and I do enjoy a good game of pool, FINALLY!