Tonight is the last chance until December 2010 to witness a total lunar eclipse. This is the third such eclipse in the past year. With any luck the weather will cooperate. It looks like there will be breaks in the clouds over the city, which should make for dramatic views. Break out the tripods and cameras! A lunar eclipse occurs when the earth wedges itself between the sun and moon, casting its shadow on the......

Photograph of a section of the Texaco map by Sybil Young/NYC Parks & Recreation For the 1964-1965 World's Fair, architect Philip Johnson designed the New York State Pavillion in Flushing Meadows Corona Park. Besides the well-known observation towers (think Men in Black) and the Theaterama, he commissioned a "130-foot-by-166-foot terrazzo replica of a Texaco New York State road map." However, after vandalism and weather, the past decades have damaged the map to the point......

Photograph of Mayor Bloomberg speaking at the State of the City address by Mary Altaffer/AP Mayor Bloomberg sounded some broad themes in his seventh State of the City address. Held at the new ice skating rink at Flushing-Meadows Corona Park in Queens, his speech outlined initiatives the city and various city agencies will undertake (digital 911 so you can send the NYPD photos from cell phones by this summer! reforming the Board of Elections!......

SHOP: Still looking for that perfect gift? The Brooklyn Historical Society is holding the 4th Annual NY Creates Craft Fair, and they may have just what you're looking for. Check it out today and tomorrow, and it will be back the 22nd and 23rd for the real last-minute shoppers. Friday and Saturday // Noon to 6pm // BHS [128 Pierrepont St, Brooklyn] ART: Too much is going on the First Friday of every month, so......

At the end of a row of newspaper boxes lining a street in Corona Plaza is an orange number offering a free publication titled, "This Is What I Eat." The eight-page newspaper is also being given out at a nearby Associated Supermarket. The design screams supermarket circular, but "This Is What I Eat" is actually a public art project created by Stephanie Diamond. Diamond asked the residents of New York City's most diverse nabe about......

MOVIE: The new Hairspray has set up special Sing-A-Long screenings! They begin nationwide today, and there will be three right here in New York. If you don't like rowdy theaters, skip this one! All Weekend // Various Times // Regal Union Sq 14; Clearview Chelsea 9; AMC Empire 42nd 25 MUSIC: Head down to the Seaport for an evening of Billie Holiday tunes. Turntables on the Hudson will be celebrating the release of Billie Holiday......

After hearing about the tragic rush-hour bridge collapse in Minneapolis that has claimed at least four lives, we wondered what the conditions of New York City's bridges were. Like the Interstate 35W bridge in Minneapolis, several of our city's largest bridges are undergoing what seems like constant construction. All the East River bridges are either undergoing repairs right now, have plans for the future, just finished construction, or all of the above. Gothamist looked......

TONY blog has a report on the most endangered sites in the world. The World Monuments Fund released its 2008 list yesterday, which is packed with far off places. The U.S. isn't exempt, of course, with a whopping seven endangered structures: the Salk Institute in California, the Frank Lloyd Wright–designed Florida Southern University Historic Campus, historic neighborhoods of New Orleans, Route 66, Main Street Modern, Tutuveni Petroglyph Site in Arizona and our very own New......

Now we know what happened to the NYPD's 2003 pilot program to have some of its officers use Segways: The batteries (which were eventually recalled) would make the entire Segway stop when they were dead, so officers were fall off. Now, the NYPD has decided the newer models are up to snuff and will make like it's 2003 by having 10 Segways patrol various parts of the city starting today. The NYPD officers aboard Segways......

April 14: Denise Landis at Broadway Panhandler Join Denise Landis, recipe tester for The New York Times, as she shares recipes and expertise from her newest cookbook, Dinner for Eight. Free tasting and book signing to follow the demonstration. Broadway Panhandler, 65 East 8th Street (between Broadway and University), 3 PM, free. April 16: A Menupoems Reading April is National Poetry Month and Alimentum is joining in the celebration with Menupoems. During the month, participating......

THEATER: We could try to describe Neal Medlyn's Coming In The Air Tonight, but why bother when there’s this: “The show features a variety of Phil Collins and Genesis music and is about how Neal is starting to slowly fall apart due to how he's all torn up inside from getting his heart broken into tiny pieces. It is also about how Neal steals a lot of stuff from people. Like their belongings and house......

We think there is still free access to Times Select articles today, so we urge you to read Dan Barry's column about the NY State Pavilion from the 1964 World's Fair. Here's the opening: Once there were elevators gliding up the sides of the towers to reveal a city unfolding; now they are rusted in mid-rise. Once there were stairwells winding within those towers; now they are rotted through. The call for a better......

MOVIES: Seriously, like there is anything else to see this weekend besides Snakes on a Plane. C'mon, you know you wanna. Everytime // Everywhere // $10.75(ish) THEATER: One of the few things the Fringe Festival doesn't have, somewhat surprisingly, is a full-fledged outdoor production. If you want to take advantage of good weather this weekend, check out Pulse Ensemble Theatre's urban adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. Directed by Alexa Kelly and performed on a small......

With the weather so nice, it's the perfect opportunity to head to Flushing today to check out the final day of the Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival in New York. Today's races have already started, but the event lasts until 6 p.m., with the last race scheduled for 5:09 (it will undoubtedly be running late). If watching various teams compete in dragon boats from the shores of Meadow Lake in Flushing Meadows Corona Park,......

- Get your seersucker suits and sun dresses out! Tomorrow evening is the 138th running of the Belmont Stakes, the third leg of the Triple Crown and horse racing's "Test of the Champion." Races on stakes day begin at noon with post time for the Belmont Stakes at 6:33 pm Television coverage starts at noon on ESPN with coverage on ABC starting at 5. The current favorite for the race is Bluegrass Cat, but......

Could there be another World's Fair coming to Flushing-Meadows? The Bureau of International Exhibitions has reportedly asked New York City if it'd be interested in hosting a fair in 2012 or 2015. The Flushing Meadows Corona Park World's Fair Association is very enthusiastic about the idea, with its president David Oats explaining, "The U.S. hasn't had a fair in two decades. Since they [the committee] opened the door, we felt we had an obligation to......

Yay for optimism, because that seems to be the key word at the Department of Sanitation. The DoS and the city have launched a new anti-littering campaign - "Stomp Out Litter." And it features the cast of Stomp traipsing around the city, from Times Square to the Bronx Zoo - even Flushing Meadows Corona Park. Funny, it looks so glamorous, so "Rent" when the cast of Stomp stomps out litter. DoS Commissioner John Doherty......

With the proposed chill coming this weekend, we thought it would be a good to remind everyone that the city's ice skating rinks will be closing on April 2. Yes, the Pond in Bryant Park has been closed since January and Prospect Park's rink closed last weekend, but there's still the Abe Stark Rink at Coney Island, World’s Fair Ice Skating Rink in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, the Staten Island War Memorial Ice Skating Rink......

It's finally over! The New York Jets have officially ended their bid for the West Side Railyards and their quest to put a football stadium in Manhattan. Now, the MTA will be free to bid out the land to whomever they please while the Jets try to figure out whether or not they want to share another stadium with the Giants in Jersey or if Queens politicians will bend over and offer them the......

Queens Borough President Helen Marshall really wants the Jets to move to Queens so much that she says she's fine with getting rid of the Fountain of Planets in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. Marshall made the point that no one will care about the Fountain of Planets because it's filled with garbage. Mayor Bloomberg was with Marshall when she made that comment yesterday, and he said, "If it's filled with garbage there will be somebody there......

Cue the Jaws music: The snakehead is here! A snakehead fish was found in Queens. Oh, yes, at Flushing Meadows-Corona Park's Meadow Lake, biologists found a couple of the "voracious" snakeheads there. Gothamist remembers when we would read these wild Washington Post articles in 2002 that would get more and more hysterical as more and more snakeheads seems to be spotted. Snakeheads apparently eat everything in its environment, thusly taking over a lake and depleting......

This weekend is the Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival at Flushing Meadows Corona Park in Queens. The festival is based on a legend of a Chinese kingdom official's honor (he commited suicide by drowning when unjustly vilified), and dragon boat racing is competitive sport. The races and festivities, including Monkey King dances and Shaolin warrior monks, occur on both Saturday and Sunday. Check here for directions. Other things you can do this weekend: Check out......

The city has announced its final Olympic venue plan for the NYC 2012 Olympics bid. There are three main clusters where the games would be held: "Olympic Square at Hudson Yards on the Far West Side of Manhattan" for track & field, the opening and closing ceremonies, plus other actitivities like fencing and judo at the Javits Center; "Olympic Park at Flushing Meadows-Corona Park," where archery, rowing, slalom (!!!), tennis and water polo would be;......

The Parks Department is wondering what to do with the New York Pavilion from the 1964-65 World's Fair, including those 250-foot towers, you see when driving in Queens (okay, sitting in a car, bus, or airport shuttle). The Post reports that the Parks Department is asking developers for their ideas to revive that part of Flushing Corona Park. The towers themselves are crumbling and many of the inside features are rusted through and useless, though......

The last kite Gothamist flew prominently featured Rainbow Brite--but that might soon change. April is National Kite Month, and the American Kitefliers Association has put together a ton of activities in the New York area for kids, amateur fliers, and those, ahem, serious kite aficionados out there. Honestly, Gothamist can't believe the hipsters haven't reclaimed lovable, kitschy kiteflying as their weekend activity of choice. (It's the logical next step after rollerskating.) It probably has something......

It's the 13th Annual Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival. Festivites and races take place today and tomorrow, from 9AM- 5PM, at Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Meadow Lake. (Take the 7 train to Willets Point - Shea Stadium; then walk or take the trolley...check courtesy desk Unfortunately, subway maintenance limits service to Willets Point - thanks reader David). There are races, Dragon parades, arts & crafts... With more than 90 expert teams involving over 1,000......