The people have taken back the park.
Life finally returned to normal at Zuccotti Park yesterday, as a crew of hard hats working at the World Trade Center enjoyed their lunch free of Occupy Wall Street tents, drums, and druggies.
“This was our spot!” exclaimed Local 580 ironworker Vinny DelPrincipe, 40, chomping on a sandwich along with 20 or so buddies despite an overcast sky.
“Now that they finally got rid of all the degenerates, it’s ours again.”
He and his fellow hard hats — union members all — cheered Mayor Bloomberg’s decision last week to tear down the tent city.
“It’s the best thing the city could have done — finally throw everyone out of here,” said another Local 580 ironworker Thomas Hamann, 45, who, like the others, is working at Four World Trade Center.
The men grubbed in the southern end of the park — and there wasn’t a protester around.
The 30 or so holdout protesters cowered at the opposite end of Zuccotti during yesterday’s lunch hour — steering clear of the tough construction crew.
“It’s definitely nice to have our lunch spot back. We had been down here for eight or nine months before the protest started,” said Local 28 worker Greg Frome, 32.
Meanwhile, the hot-headed protester from Ohio busted Saturday, allegedly with a handgun and a cache of bullets, remained locked up in the Tombs in lieu of $25,000 bail.
Tattoo artist Joshua Fellows, 32, of Youngstown, was charged with criminal possession of a weapon after cops found an unlicensed .45 and 32 rounds of ammo in a rental truck he’d been driving around the protest.
In another development, a couple who claim they were roughed up by cops during an OWS-related protest last month filed a federal lawsuit against the city.
Heather Carpenter and Julio José Jimenez-Artunduaga seek unspecified damages for their Oct. 15 encounter outside a Greenwich Village Citibank branch.