A Bowl Grows in Queens

Bridges play an outsize role in skateboarding. Whether its the Brooklyn [Bridge] Banks, the I-95 overpass that covers FDR Skatepark, or the Burnside Bridge, we have extracted infinite joy from the fact that the powers-that-be generally do not give a shit about what you do under a bridge.

And no bridge has risen to such rapid prominence in skateboarding as the new Kosciuszko Bridge, which was completed in 2017. (If someone had a gun to your head and made you spell “Kosciuszko” out loud, you’re a goner too, right?)

The Kosciuszko has given us the cement ledges on the Brooklyn side, and ultimately, K Bridge Park itself, which became a retirement home to Blue Park obstacles, host of the reborn Manny Mania, and generally a fine-enough option for when your crew can’t decide on something better.

The Queens side has yielded the cut-out curbs that controlled the Instagram explore page in 2019 (see #24), an asphalt hip, and a bunch of D.I.Y. shit that has survived longer than most D.I.Y. spots survive in this city. (Not including the B.Q.E. spot obviously, which proved itself to be apocalypse-proof this year.)

So those very same powers-that-be decided, “You know what? What else are we going to do with that fucking obtuse trapezoid of land surrounded by beer cans and stray bumpers? We build something for the skaters and maybe in five years, we can circle back to surrounding it with condos.”

The park is called “Flow Skatepark” on Google, and is opposite of the curbs/hip on the Queens side.

Looking south, you’ll see the mini bowl for which this article is named, with a towering wave/wallride/thing to its side that has loose resemblance to that famous one in Paris.

At the bottom, you’ll find a fairly mainstream quarterpipe, with this volcano thing in front of it, and that has loose resemblance to the famous brick one in Philly. If you live in this crib across the street, your volcano-skating abilities are going to become something you’ll want to mention in your Hinge profile.

Keep turning your head north, and things get …um, interesting.

A Straight Fucking Ledge™, cool, yeah. This mellow launch ramp pair thing, ok, sure.

Then there is a steep-ass low hubba that you need to drop into a quarterpipe on to skate, some long-ass low rails, and then…

Have you seen that Simpsons episode where Ned’s house gets destroyed by a hurricane, and then the townspeople surprise him by rebuilding it overnight? He’s overcome with emotion as he enters the house, but slowly starts to realize the interiors are a bit more…avant-garde than he remembers.

Yeah, the rest of the park is kinda like that. “Pretty clev-arrr,” indeed.

But to quote Zered after the Greenpoint skatepark that would go on to bear his name was revealed: “Yeah, it’s terrible…but I’ll still skate it all the time.”