To the untrained eye, the assortment of bars used for pull-ups, dips, and hanging leg raises in the corner of Tompkins Square Park looks a bit worse for wear.<\/p>\n
But the motley crew of calisthenics enthusiasts who gather here swears they don\u2019t make them as they used to \u2014 and they must be preserved.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you grab these bars, they actually feel different,\u201d said personal trainer Danny Kavadlo during a recent morning session. \u201c\u200aAs far as I understand, these bars were built with Canadian steel, and the new stuff that’s getting built now is not.\u201d<\/p>\n
The New York City Parks Department is considering replacing these bars as part of a nearly $10 million<\/a> plan to upgrade and expand the nearby mini-pool. Many New Yorkers might welcome a multi-million-dollar investment in their local park. But the devotees hope the city can sidestep the jungle gym during the renovation.<\/p>\n Kavadlo, the author of books<\/a> such as \u201cStreet Workout\u201d and \u201cDiamond-Cut Abs,\u201d said the bars have been seasoned by years of use.<\/p>\n \u201cYou literally have the blood, sweat, and tears of calisthenics athletes and non-athletes and the community putting their hands on these bars and getting strong together, and that you can’t manufacture or quantify,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Nearly 2,000 people have signed a Change.org petition<\/a> to \u201csave\u201d the fitness area.<\/p>\n Stephon Stallworth of Brooklyn does pull-ups at Tompkins Square Park.<\/p>\n Robert Barba\/Gothamist<\/p>\n The group devoted to Tompkins\u2019 bars is diverse in age and ability. Weekdays tend to be quieter, with most working out in rubber-palmed gloves and headphones. Weekends can get wild, with the hardcore calisthenics athletes performing aerial tricks while music blares from a boombox.<\/p>\n \u201c\u200aA lot of the gang, we love these bars,\u201d said 79-year-old Dennis Parlato. \u201cDon\u2019t touch them.\u201d<\/p>\n He has been using the exercise bars for the past two decades, he said, adding that the city should use the money elsewhere.<\/p>\n \u201c\u200aWhy are they so insistent on repairing things that are in great shape in a city where every penny could be used for so many other needy things?\u201d Parlato said.<\/p>\n The current exercise bars date back to 1990. They sit in the northeast corner of the park, next to a pair of basketball courts and a dilapidated above-ground children\u2019s pool.<\/p>\n The Parks Department wants to demolish the old pool and build a larger in-ground pool with a wider deck. But key piping and plumbing lines run underneath the courts and fitness area, according to city officials.<\/p>\n Councilmember Harvey Epstein, who represents the East Village, said he was initially surprised by the backlash to the project.<\/p>\n \u201cYou have to respect that people like the equipment and use it every day, and that we have to figure out a way to make this work for all New Yorkers,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is our responsibility. It\u2019s their park.\u201d<\/p>\n Devotees of Tompkins Square Park’s bars want the city to preserve them.<\/p>\n Walter Wuthmann\/Gothamist<\/p>\n Epstein stressed that nobody opposes upgrading the pool. He said he\u2019s asking the Parks Department whether there\u2019s a way to replace the underground piping without disturbing the fitness area.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s the million-dollar question Parks has to answer,\u201d Epstein said.<\/p>\n In a statement, a spokesperson for the Parks Department said planners are still in the \u201cearly design stages,\u201d and that community input would be incorporated along the way.<\/p>\n Tompkins Square Park, the heart of the East Village, has long fostered something of an iconoclastic streak.<\/p>\n It\u2019s the site of multiple riots<\/a>. In more recent years, a group of skateboarders and street hockey players organized<\/a> to oppose a Parks Department plan to cover a patch of barren concrete with turf. The city eventually dropped the plans and instead repaired the asphalt and added new features<\/a> for the skateboarders.<\/p>\n The exercise bar fanatics now hope they can score a win like the skateboarders.<\/p>\n \u201cIt looks simple, but this s–t means a lot to us,\u201d said Avenue D resident Jahmal Kirwan, who also raps under the name Manhattan Mal. \u201cIt looks like a bulls–t jungle gym, but this is a real gym.\u201d<\/p>\n Kirwan said working out at the exercise bars helped keep him out of trouble as a kid. He said he and his friends now teach other children in the neighborhood how to use them.<\/p>\n \u201cKeep the bars,\u201d he said. \u201cKeep Tompkins.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"To the untrained eye, the assortment of bars used for pull-ups, dips, and hanging leg raises in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300590,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-300589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/300590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}