Mall officials signed a contract Tuesday agreeing to maintain Boulder's quirky annual event by hosting its games, competitions and procession of homemade human-powered crafts May 3.
There will, however, be significant differences between the old, familiar Kinetics and the revised version.
The event traditionally has culminated with participants' crafts racing on the Boulder Reservoir -- an event which, at one point, drew 40,000 people -- but this year there will be little, if any, water involved. Instead, the day's events will be on pavement in the mall's northeast parking lot, along 30th Street.
"But we're keeping elements of tradition throughout," one organizer, Paul Bailey, said Tuesday.
For instance, there will be the fa-miliar celebrity judges who critique the crazy crafts every year, he said.
And, Bailey said, the grassroots group of organizers -- which rallied to save Kinetics in November after former sponsor KBCO "suspended" its support -- also has vowed to try to include some "water elements" in this year's all-pavement event.
"The public might be able to squirt guns at the competitors," he said.
Initially, underground organizers said there would be "unofficial" Kinetics events -- following the mall parade -- at either the reservoir, Boulder Creek or a public park.
But, after city officials said they must have a permit for an event of more than 50 people, Bailey's group revised its original proposal and decided to keep all the day's activities on mall property.
Kinetics events are scheduled to start at 9 a.m. May 3 with a series of challenges in which participants test the mettle of their homemade creations in drag races, stop contests, flag grabs, cart spins, ring tosses and ride mazes.
From 11 a.m. to noon, the crafts -- about a dozen teams so far have signed up to build human-powered vehicles -- will be on display along the mall, Bailey said.
From noon to about 1 p.m., a parade will stream down 29th Street, with judges taking notes of each vehicle on the north end while singers battle one another in karaoke contests on the south end.
The Kinetics challenge started in Boulder in 1980 with the financial help of KBCO. When the Boulder radio station announced it was dropping its support last year, an uprising of longtime participants and fans searched for a new sponsor.
The Boulder Jaycees and Twenty Ninth Street have stepped in.
"We hope that this will be the beginning of a new, revitalized Boulder tradition that focuses back on the Kinetics crafts, the engineering behind them and the nerdy goofiness of this event," said Curt Williams, Jaycees president.
Paul Bousquet, spokesman for Boulder's Parks and Recreation department, said the city would like to be involved in future Kinetics events.
"I think it's great that they worked something out at Twenty Ninth Street, and I'm glad Kinetics is still around," Bousquet said.
"If they want to bring it back to a city park or the reservoir, that would be great," he said, adding that organizers would need to apply for a permit to allow neighbors and authorities time to prepare for the event. "We are still wide open to working with them."