Gulfport, MS Public Conduct: Skateboarding Rules (2026)

Section 6-40 of the Gulfport Code of Ordinances, carried forward from the 1963 Code section 25-29, groups skateboards in with roller skates, coasters and other 'similar' toy vehicles for purposes of city traffic law. S. Highway 90. The single carve-out in the ordinance is for crossing a street: a rider on roller skates, a coaster or a similar device may use a marked crosswalk to get from one side of the road to the other, and while doing so is treated exactly like a pedestrian, gaining pedestrian right-of-way and taking on pedestrian duties such as yielding outside a marked or unmarked intersection crosswalk under section 6-235.

The ordinance also carries a built-in exception for 'play streets,' a category the city council may designate by separate ordinance to open specific blocks to children's recreational use, but no such designation currently appears elsewhere in the traffic chapter. Because the section sits in the general traffic-obedience scheme rather than in a stand-alone skateboard ordinance, a violation is enforced the same way any other traffic infraction is: an officer of the Gulfport Police Department, charged under section 6-36 with enforcing 'all street traffic regulations,' can cite a rider found on the roadway outside a crosswalk. Since section 6-40 sets no fine of its own, a violation defaults to the Code's general penalty in section 1-9.