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Legendary Skate Park Under the Brooklyn Bridge Will Close Next Week

By Julie Shapiro | June 4, 2010 3:54pm | Updated on June 5, 2010 10:23am

By Julie Shapiro

DNAinfo Reporter/Producer

LOWER MANHATTAN — The famously gritty skate spot under the Brooklyn Bridge is closing next week for at least four years.

The city is shutting down the Brooklyn Banks as soon as Tuesday to use the brick plaza a staging area for the Brooklyn Bridge reconstruction. City contractors started removing the split rail and other skate obstacles Friday afternoon.

“I’m obviously bummed,” said Steve Rodriguez, owner of 5boro Skateboards and the lead advocate for the Banks.

Even though the city's transportation department reached out to him to discuss the closure and preserve some of the equipment, Rodriguez is disappointed that New York couldn’t find a way to keep part of the space open.

Skateboarders have been drawn to the brick slopes beneath the bridge since the 1960s and ’70s, and today the legendary spot attracts everyone from West Coast pros to local kids just learning how to do tricks.

“For them to close it is just ridiculous,” said Alex Noy, 19, while skating the Banks Friday morning. “I love this place. So much skateboarding history has gone down here.”

Noy’s friend Eroide Galano, 23, said most skate parks are too controlled, with rules about helmets and the types of tricks that can be done on each obstacle.

“Here, you come and you just skate,” Galano said.

The friends live in Orlando and were in New York for this weekend’s Maloof Money Cup skate competition in Queens.

Rodriguez said that while hundreds of skateboarders are in town for the Maloof Cup, most won’t visit the Banks because they think the park is already closed.

The city announced the closure last fall and has delayed it several times since then, most recently because of Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to the Brooklyn Bridge on Wednesday.

A Department of Transportation spokeswoman said the closure is now tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, and Rodriguez heard it would definitely happen next week.

The $508 million rehabilitation of the Brooklyn Bridge won’t finish until 2014, at which point Rodriguez hopes the city will turn the Banks back over to the skateboarders and BMX bikers.

Those who have skated the Banks say there will never be a substitute.

“This is the most fun I’ve ever had at a skate spot,” said Weston Elrod, 22, an Upstate New York native, who now lives in California. “The clickety-clack of your wheels on the brick — you couldn’t recreate this if you tried. And that’s the beauty of it: It’s not meant for skating, but it’s perfect for skating.”

As Elrod caught his breath after looping around the Banks, he said the skateboard community needs a savior who fights for them like Teddy Roosevelt fought to preserve the country’s parks.

“This is our Yosemite,” Elrod said. “It would be a shame if it closed forever.”