In Da Club

South Park Tavern, formerly 60 South, has extinguished its once-bright gay-bar flames and converted to a broader sports-bar appeal. The new owners have hacked out a few walls at 60 South Broadway to reveal the pub's surprisingly vast square footage and have given the once-claustrophobic entrance a much-needed gulp of breathing room. The space is packed with new pool tables, air hockey, a South Park-themed pinball machine and the khaki-shorts-lovers pinnacle: a Golden Tee video game. But even the bling of the machines isn't quite enough distraction to disguise the ever-present handyman hovering overhead. A better diversion is South Park's mean happy hour, earned three times a day by tossing a free-drink chip alongside each beer from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., 4:30 to 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. to 1 a.m. If you drink enough, you won't mind the dust. Although it lost Friday's popular Lipgloss (which will debut at its new digs in La Rumba this Friday, April 2), the Tavern has added a Saturday goth night dubbed Disintegration. That may seem like fodder for fire in a jock bar -- but the jukebox is red-hot for everyone, sporting everything from Creedence Clearwater Revival and Mötley Crüe to the Breeders and the Hives. South Park Tavern has all the right trappings for a neighborhood spot, but its remodeling leaves new patrons fearing falling hammers.