T.F. Gramercy | Quartersnacks

arizona cans dollar

It’s December. You know what that means. We pontificate on the past eleven months.

Previously…2014: 25-21, 20-16, 15-11, 10-6, 5-1 / 2013: 25-21, 20-16, 15-11, 10-6, 5-1 / 2012: 25-21, 20-16, 15-11, 10-6, 5-1 / 2011: 25-21, 20-16, 15-11, 10-6, 5-1 / 2010: 25-21, 20-16, 15-11, 10-6, 5-1

25. The Arizona Inflation Crisis of 2015

Eras in recent New York skateboarding are earmarked by shifts in the lowest of price points. For example: Up until it was phased out in maybe 2003, the chicken cutlet sandwich + can of soda for $2 deal at Universal News kept half the people I know fed. By late-2005, Little Debbie’s line of 25-cent snack cakes had doubled in price. Dollar menus were becoming dollar-and-up “value menus.” Some psychopaths really tried to charge tax on a dollar slice.

And now, the beverage that we lovingly spent our adolescence drinking, and punishing our blood sugar levels with, is trying to pull a fast one. You’re ranting about a generation of kids being homogenized by a skatepark; I’m more worried about the thought that they’ll have to pay $2 for an Arizona tall can, or $1 for 11.5 oz. of one.

abyss

How deep? Deep as the abyss. Photo by Gigliotti.

The other day, I met some people at T.F. West. After the hour-long pandering that goes on whenever the “where are we gonna skate?”-question is raised, some permit-wielding kickballers showed up. Outnumbered and frustrated, we left the park.

“So-and-so is at T.F.” An hour of half-hearted flat skating and aimless shittalking — it was not enough. We still craved a new chainlink cage with nothing more than flatground and maybe a trash receptacle to put on its side. We half-walked/half-skated the twenty minutes to T.F.

After a half-hour at T.F., a suggestion was made: “So-and-so wants to a try a trick over the can off the bump on 20th Street.”

The “bump” on 20th Street? You mean that small groove on the ground that just-maybe-kinda-but-kinda-not hoists you up? In an empty court surrounded by a chainlink cage? How did we get here? Three T.Fs in one day? We’ve been everywhere and back but I just can’t remember it all. What am I doing?

Here’s a complete history of how we got here.

2000: Alien Workshop’s Photosynthesis video is released. The second half of Robert Dyrdek’s part is filmed at a graffiti-covered indoor facility, which we later learn is called the “Training Facility” or “T.F.” for short. (This place later proved to be a blueprint for the “Fantasy Factory,” but that is a topic for another day.)

Tag: T.F. Gramercy

The QS Year in Review Countdown: 25-21

The History of T.Fs in New York: 2000-2015