It’s rare that you see a neighborhood’s culinary standing invert itself as thoroughly as Park Slope’s has done in recent years. Once known for its awful restaurants on Seventh Avenue, it’s now known for the growing cadre of good ones on Fifth. But throughout the Slope’s changing food fortunes, one truism has endured: It’s a lousy neighborhood for pizza.

I don’t just mean it’s been hard to find a decent slice – that’s a citywide problem that goes way beyond Park Slope. A full pie, however, doesn’t sit on the counter for hours or go through reheating, so getting a respectable pie is usually an easier proposition. But not in the Slope, which has become notorious among foodies as a pizza wasteland, despite having dozens of pizza outlets.

But over the last year or so, things have been changing. Three brick-oven pizzerias have opened in the north Slope, all of them turning out wood-roasted pies that are miles away from the greasy, cardboard-crusted fare that has long been the neighborhood norm. With a fourth wood-burning outlet slated to open shortly in adjacent Prospect Heights, this corner of brownstone Brooklyn suddenly finds itself on the verge of becoming the improbable epicenter of a pizza renaissance.

“As recently as a year ago, we had no hope,” said Adam Kuban, who lives in Park Slope and runs the excellent pizza-centric blog Slice (www.sliceny.com). “But now that’s all changed. It’s part of a growing citywide and even nationwide trend toward well crafted pizza.”

The movement got its start about a year ago with the arrival of La Villa (261 Fifth Ave., 718-499-9888). The tacky decor and ambiance are straight out of a mall – if you think Park Slope is all bespectacled yuppies and exposed brick, you’ll have to re vise that concept after a visit here – but it’s easy enough to ignore all that once you see the wood logs blazing away inside the brick oven.

The staff tells me they keep the oven at about 670 degrees. That’s not particularly hot for a wood-burning oven, which explains why the crust on a La Villa pie ($17.50 for a one-topping large) is sort of a transitional mix of crisp and chewy. It holds up well under the standard array of toppings. A major step up from the standard neighborhood pizzeria pie.

The brick-oven ante was upped in April with the opening of Franny’s (295 Flatbush Ave., 718-230-0221). Sure enough, here are the bespectacled yuppies and the exposed brick. More importantly, here is some first-rate pizza.

One of the cooks told me that Franny’s wood oven runs at 900 degrees – remarkable if true, since that’s usually coal-oven territory. But I believe him, because the crust here is gorgeously blackened – not quite scorched, but just close enough so you can smell the smokiness of the fire. It easily passes the crucial test for any pizza crust: If it was served on its own as bread, you’d be happy to eat it.

The sauce is generally unassuming and works as a foil for the small pools of mozzarella that dot the surface. Toppings are of unusually high quality, particularly the house-cured meats such as garlic sausage, fennel salami, and pancetta. The result is pizza that’s every bit the equal of longtime brick-oven stalwarts like John’s, Grimaldi’s, and Totonno’s.

But Franny’s has a few irksome drawbacks. For starters, the smallish pies ($9-$15), which are about 12 inches across, arrive at the table unsliced, so you have to cut them yourself with a fork and knife. It’s not clear if this is meant to be eccentric or just contrary, but the house cutlery ends up butchering the delicate crust. If you have a pizza cutter, bring it along.

There’s also a cloying sense of political correctness at Franny’s. I’m all in favor of sustainable agriculture, buying ingredients from local sources, and so on, but Franny’s goes out of its way to push this angle. The back of the menu even touts the restaurant’s “sweatshop-free, eco-friendly” T-shirts, and Franny’s Web site has a prominent “Our Philosophy” link, explaining the owners’ ideals.

That’s all laudable, but frankly I’m not looking for a philosophy from my pizzeria – the only thing I want to contemplate while eating pizza is, well, pizza. Fortunately, it’s possible to do just that at Peperoncino (72 Fifth Ave., 718-638-4760). The tastefully appointed room, with its rustic wooden tables and low lighting, feels cozy and lived-in, even though the restaurant opened just a few weeks ago.

The pies here ($9-$16) are about the same size as those at Franny’s but, thankfully, are sliced. The wood-burning oven runs around 700 degrees, which turns out to be just right for the light crust, which is more pillowy than at most brick-oven venues – “It’s almost like pastry,” noted one of my companions.

This crust doesn’t have the smoky complexity of Franny’s, but it has an airiness that pairs well with the restaurant’s excellent fior de latte mozzarella. Many of the specialty pizzas are particularly good, including the titular Peperoncino pie, which features cherry tomatoes, grilled zucchini, and some spectacularly briny shrimp.

As if all these wood-fired pizzerias weren’t enough, another one will soon be joining the fray: The owners of the well-regarded Italian restaurant Aliseo, just a few blocks away from Franny’s in Prospect Heights, plan to open a pizza annex across the street from their main space within a few weeks.

It all adds up to an embarrassment of pizza riches – a fair tradeoff after all those years when the Slope was a pizza wasteland. Now if they could just do something about all the awful places on Seventh Avenue.