Tompkins Square Park
By the 1980s, the park became known not only for embodying the spirit of the East Village through punk music and drag shows (above: Lady Bunny), but also as a haven for the homeless. Clashes with police echoed the clashes that happened here one century before. The park still maintains a curfew left over from the strife of the late 1980s.
Tompkins Square Park
For some longtime residents, gentrification wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Many middle class families thought the park had become overrun with homeless people, drugs and noisy concerts and needed to be cleaned up.
"People didn't want the neighborhood to lose its character," Calhoun said. "They didn't want the artists not to be able to afford to live here, but they wanted their kids to be able to play in the park."
On August 6, 1988, squatters, activists and homeless people gathered in the park to demonstrate against the curfew. The protest quickly turned violent when demonstrators clashed with police. Dozens of people were injured.
As for the curfew, the city quickly dropped it, but protests continued for years. Finally, in 1991, the city cleared out the homeless, erected fencing and began renovating the park. Now, it is all cleaned up and closes at midnight.
The city has approved a plan to cover the northwest corner of Tompkins Sq park with synthetic turf. This plan was approved without support from the community. The area of the park they would be renovating has a historical and sacred importance to skateboarders and other community members who would be excluded from the new facility. Hopefully this petition will reflect the interests of the people who use the park the most! Lets make it clear: we don't want our corner of the park altered!
A multi-use, open asphalt area in the East Village is scarce. If the city goes ahead with this approved plan, it would alienate many of the end users of the park, who have called it a home for decades, and built a community around this small patch of sacred asphalt.
Skateboarding has been a part of Tompkins Square Park since the 1980s, when Shut Skateboards would lug over makeshift ramps and throw contests there. Skaters continued to call Tompkins a home ever since. In the years after 9/11, when much of the city was under lockdown and the places we skated in before became closed off for security measures, Tompkins became a hassle-free refuge for the skate community thanks to the nearby ABC and Autumn Skateshops, who would bring ramps to the park, and store them in their stores overnight. We have quite literally shoveled snow out of the way to skate here before.
Please reconsider repaving Thompkins Square Park. The Park means so much to the community and the community loves it the way it is. A great place to learn to ride a bike dribble a basketball rollerblade roller skate roller hockey skateboard and more. The people of the community love this park and changing it will only push away the people who enjoy using it so much. This park means so much to so many people. I respectfully ask that you reconsider any changes and consult the faithful patrons who love this park so much and who have made Thompkins Square Park not only a local gem but a national treasure.
The asphalt area in tompkins park is a place not only for skate borders on a daily basis, but also hosts weekend roller hockey groups and sport tournaments held by NYC sport groups. Any change will impact numerous people negatively, including kids learning how to skate, high schoolers, young professionals, etc.
Hi my name is killian i am fifteen and spent the first 7 years of my life living on ave. A between 9th and 10th streets next to the bodega across the street for the courts. When i was 5 my dad taught me how to ride my first bike in tomkins square park. I now live in queens but still go there all the time to skate ive been skating since i was about nine and have learned so much in the time ive been going to that park. i and so many other skaters bikers basketball players etc. would be so disappointed if there were any changes that would cause it to no longer be usable so please i ask that the city reconsider there plans on adding turf to the park. Thank you.
Tompkins Square Park is a famous square in the East Village, Manhattan. Known for attracting artists, poets, radicals and the like, it has also been the site of several protests and riots since the late 19th century. On this opening track, it serves as a backdrop for a troubled love affair.
I also new him. He moved into our squat on 5th between A and B. I remember him approaching us on the stoop, with, what i thought was a comedy act, and weed. He would say outlandish things about there not being enough women in our group and that we could keep some in the basement with chains.Hahaha(?!)Anyway he also kept chickens and briefly, a goat, as well as all his urine and feces in five gallon buckets. What a charmer. I had left in dec 88, and didnt return till the following september. I picked up a village voice with him on it, and curious, took it to tomkins to read. Aw geez. Friends in the park told me some details, one, Robert(lobar) told me of finding a finger in his cup..
The Josh Ozersky memorial bench is located within Tompkins Square Park between the dog run and Avenue B. The closest entrance is on the corner of Avenue B and East 9th Street. The park closes at Midnight.
The riot marked the end of politics as art and life as a performance, hallmarks of the alternative cultures for which the East Village was known. But even more important, the police denial of access to the park signaled the local triumph of gentrification.
After the riot of 6 August, police officers were censured and some lost or left their jobs. Within a few years, the Civilian Complaint Review Board was reorganized to remove police members. But the question of who would control the park, and the even larger issue of gentrification, were not resolved.
In 1991, a homeless encampment in Tompkins Square Park was forcefully destroyed by the city government. During the previous few years, rising numbers of homeless men and women had spilled into more streets and parks. Some of them had been chased out of Washington Square Park by the police and out of Union Square Park by the business improvement district that managed it. In Tompkins Square Park, they slept on benches and erected tents.
As in 1988, the tent city was not accepted by all groups in the community. Parents saw the park as dirty and dangerous and could not bring their children to the playground. Many residents felt threatened by the large homeless presence and by the problems of untreated illness, alcoholism, and drug abuse they brought with them. 041b061a72