Opponents seek to grind skatepark in Brooklyn’s Mount Prospect Park to a halt

Mayor Eric Adams’ plan to build a 40,000-square-foot skatepark in partnership with renowned skateboarder Tony Hawk has encountered opposition from Brooklynites who do not want to see their greenspace covered in concrete.

In January, Adams announced plans to build or refurbish four skateparks for $24 million. The largest one is planned for Mount Prospect Park, a hilly park between the Brooklyn Museum and Brooklyn’s central library. The Mount Prospect Park location will be one of the largest on the East Coast according to Hawk's nonprofit the Skatepark Project, which is designing the parks.

The following month, a new group dubbed “Friends of Mount Prospect Park” expressed its disapproval in a letter to local politicians.

“We were shocked to hear of the plan to pave over a big swath of our beloved Mount Prospect Park, to replace it with a skateboard arena. We fully expected that our agencies and officials would consult before contemplating pouring concrete on green space that’s quite precious to us, for good reasons,” wrote the group's Co-Chairs Benjamin Lowe and Hayley Gorenberg.

Adams previously said the four skateparks will be able to host major competitions as well as boost tourism and the economy.

“Most importantly, they’ll give New Yorkers, particularly our young people, a place to get outside, have fun and express themselves on four wheels,” Adams said.

Local pro skater Troy Gipson told Gothamist that more skateparks in New York City mean more opportunities for kids to get into the sport.

“It’s a bit harder to get into skating if you don’t really have access to a park or anything like that to learn,” said Gipson, 22. “The streets here kind of suck and they’re just rough so I think it gets people, at least kids, more opportunity to get more comfortable skating.”

But Gorenberg said the project had come as a complete surprise to Prospect Heights and Crown Heights residents who use the park.

“You would have to be living under a rock if you think paving over a green space is leadership,” Gorenberg said. “The climate crisis, the flooding that we’re experiencing, the COVID pandemic, all of these ongoing crises in our city, and the world, have more than taught us the lesson that we need to preserve our greenspace and if anything, to grow it.”

Gorenberg and other opponents planned to meet with local Councilmember Crystal Hudson on Thursday afternoon.

“We haven’t gone through the design process and there will be a public community engagement process,” Hudson said.

Hudson shot down opponents’ suggestions to relocate the planned skatepark to nearby Grand Army Plaza. She said the city had opted against that location due to traffic at the roundabout, where major thoroughfares including Flatbush Avenue and Eastern Parkway converge.

Benjamin Anderson Bashein, the Skateboard Project's CEO, said the skatepark will be built in an unused, muddy section of the greenspace. He emphasized more trees will be added to the park as part of the project.

“Mount Prospect Park is a literal three minute walk from Brooklyn Botanical Garden and Prospect Park,” Bashein said in response to complaints. “This neighborhood has more access to green space than anywhere else in the five boroughs.”

According to the Skateboard Project, Mount Prospect Park covers more than 350,000 square feet. The park will be built on roughly 12% of the land.

People at Mount Prospect Park on a recent afternoon expressed frustration with the project.

Rose Rejouis said she’s come to the park for decades, and has used it for birthday parties and daily walks with her dog.

“The whole community uses this park, kids take soccer lessons here and a lot of immigrants – who work six, seven days a week – come here to play soccer. It's beautiful to see them do that,” she said.

“We cannot afford to cut a single tree or to turn any more green spaces into concrete," she said. 'I’m really against touching this park or destroying this park. It’s so beautiful and peaceful – I can’t say enough good things about it.”