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Vice Blog

TAJ CAM - R.I.P. BROOKLYN BANKS

Although it's only been a few months, it seems like the city has been threatening to close the banks for years. Every couple of weeks the rumor mill starts grindin'. Everyone says this is the last weekend, then the next weekend rolls around, and the next, and the next, and the banks stay open. I imagine the feeling a death row inmate would have if the gas chamber kept malfunctioning week after week is similar to what we've been through.

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As you can see from this official looking PDF, the 15th, or thereabouts was supposed to be the end. As of the 16th however, the banks were still open and Taj Mahal and a bunch of others gathered for one last farewell session. Here's Taji's eulogy and what is probably the last video of the banks for the foreseeable future (or not, who the hell knows what's really going on down there).

I've been skating at the Brooklyn Banks since I was ten years old. That was just a few years after you were able to go there and let your board shoot out over the pillar without having it ran up on and stolen by OG NY cats. I learned how to skate the banks from watching Steve Rodriguez destroy every wall and inch of transition in sight. To this day, I run into unfamiliar people who laugh as they remember the day I ollied the nine with a big shiny helmet on.

After September 11th, anti-skate security increased all around the city and the police began to park their cars all over the infamous "little banks." They eventually turned the human shit/piss infested area into a pedestrian park, and made it abundantly clear that skaters were not wanted on the premises by skate stopping the foreground of the banks with dirt. We were sent to the biker dominated (unless you're trying to get buck on the ten stair rail, or trying to one up Jamie Thomas on the 16 stair one) larger banks.

Eventually, the city took notice of the skater-organized "Clean the Banks" event where we would get together monthly to spit-shine the shit out of the place and the city turned it into a designated skate park. Recently however, our beloved city officials have decided to close off the entire skate area for the next seven years and do un-skate related construction. On what we're pretty sure was the last day, Yashe Popson, Kevin Tierney, Rob Campbell, and Shawn Powers did some construction of their own at the banks. Enjoy the clip, especially the part when Kevin decides to skate on dirt to reminisce of the olden days at the little banks.

TAJI AMEEN