The T.F. | Quartersnacks

The Year in T.F. Obstacles: #TFReport Special Edition

Daily News December 19th, 2012 · 11:32 am · 13

It has been a landmark year for the T.F. Some thought that it would never find #relevance in a *New* New York of accessible skateparks and children uninterested in street spots (or in its case, street spots that aren’t actually street spots.) With Autumn gone, others feared the T.F. organism could not continue life without co-dependence of a nearby shop that would supply it with sustenance by way of angle iron and wood. A select few believed that distant rival, T.F. West, could hijack key demographics at a time when the Tompkins covered our beloved green benches with caution tape. All were wrong.

Having reached its ten-year anniversary and thus solidifying its legacy (see #6), the T.F. sat back and reveled in its own immortality throughout 2012. Even new media has even helped propel Tompkins into the iPhone era: a kitschy title from the blog-only days of Epicly Later’d was transformed into a useful hashtag on the most popular social media platform among the T.F. faithful. Is there a #flushingreport, #midtownreport or #lenoxreport? You know the answer. Koston even Instagrammed from the T.F. this year, though he forgot to add #tfreport to his post.

At a time when 12th and A is fraught with internal problems and consistent closures, we have grown attached to the steadiness of the the T.F., which for the eleventh year in a row, is the most popular street spot in New York City. Join us as we look back at the obstacles that have graced Tompkins throughout 2012.

The T.F. Report

Daily News March 15th, 2012 · 4:37 pm · 6

Photo by Brian Kelley

LINSANITY made us wonder how a roster depleted of its two stars could go on an unprecedented win-streak at the helm of a previously undermined player. It turns out that the Knicks were not the only New York institution to prosper during a time that many assumed would coincide with struggle. We all left Tompkins for dead when the final post-Autumn box was stolen, believing that its influence would wane to a point where only those living within a three-block radius knew it still existed.

We were all wrong.

The Knicks had Jeremy Lin. The T.F. has two orange cones. Two equally unlikely heroes. The T.F. had not lost a step amidst this period of missing obstacles, but the issue of eventually re-introducing rails and boxes has come up for discussion. Fans of the T.F. are worried about how this could affect the current harmony happening at Tompkins Square Park. See the diagram below.

The T.F’s Final Beacon of Hope

Daily News January 12th, 2012 · 1:20 pm · 12

The dust has finally began to settle on the T.F. after the last two months’ worth of socio-political crises. Nearly all prominent East Village skateboard institutions were toppled, and much like Russia following the collapse of the Soviet Union, a gigantic landmass has been left without a stable government. The only morsel of civilization is perhaps the most archaic symbol of civilized society there is — a wooden box with angle iron.

This post is an open call to all those who have not turned their back on Tompkins at this pivotal point in history. We have documented how it has achieved legacy status, and we will all still skate here even if there is a 50-foot diameter crater in the ground with ten district attorneys’ offices playing softball around it, but let us use this one remaining box as a building block to a greater future. We are already witnessing a miracle as it approaches two weeks of life without proper storage (on track to tie or break the blue flatbar’s record.)

Several ideas have been tossed around in an effort to prolong the box’s life and stability altogether. Most notably, there is an idea of offering a contract to nearby businesses to store the box during T.F. off-hours in exchange for advertising on its exterior (chalk panels would be affixed to the sides to display daily specials.) 9th Street Espresso (skaters love coffee), Mamani’s (skaters love food that only costs $1), San Loco (skaters love diarrhea), and Blind Barber (skaters love alcohol) are several names that have come up for discussion at high-level T.F. personnel meetings. The problem is actually getting people to return the box to the said establishment should an agreement be reached. Another idea has been appealing to the most prominent weed salesmen in the area to get on some Frank Lucas/Nino Brown shit, and give back to the community by furnishing the T.F. with new obstacles, and an adjacent shipping container for their safekeeping, in exchange for a bolstered public opinion of their otherwise frowned-upon industry.

Feel free to share any ideas below (and bring the box behind the tree, next to the hockey nets next time you’re done skating it for the time being.) Astronaut Status just dropped, so maybe the T.F. won’t ever matter again, since we’ll all be living on the moon by the end of the day.

Before There Was Autumn…

Time Capsule January 11th, 2012 · 3:32 pm · 11

Last summer, we wrongly attributed the “Golden Age of the T.F.” title to the period that coincided with Lurkers 2. The “Golden Age of the T.F.” came two years earlier, between the fall of 2001 (when the T.F. was born), and the summer of 2003 (when the World Industries box was there), with its absolute pinnacle being the manual pad, one-sided box, yellow rail, and black rail days. Yes, there was a time when there were FOUR obstacles at the T.F. Over the last five years, the act of returning the box to the shop a mere half-a-block away became immensely unpopular — just imagine that at the onset of the 2000s, people would lug four obstacles all the way from 13th Street to the park.

A large portion of the people you see at the T.F. in 2012 either did not skate, or did not yet move to New York when ABC was around (sadly, the people picking up skateboards and moving here for college now missed out on both the Autumn and ABC eras.) This video should bring you up to speed the time when Tompkins was fortified by Scott Schwartz’s excellent carpentry skills. It’s a much better representation of the era than that awful and horribly-aged Alphabet City video. With all due respect to Autumn, ABC might have been the superior governing body for Tompkins (please consult this clip for a glimpse of key moments from Autumn’s reign.) Everything is left to the history books now.

It is actually perfect that the second part is edited to Ms. Jade, as she, and other Timbaland side projects like Tweet (of “Oops Oh My” and “Call Me” fame) were massive favorites on the ABC shop speakers. Shout to NY Skateboarding for discovering this one.