The name points to Flushing in Queens, a place this avenue never reaches.
Flushing began as the Dutch settlement of Vlissingen, named after the city of Vlissingen in the Netherlands, whose English name is Flushing. The avenue runs from Fort Greene to Maspeth and stops short of it. According to a list of historic North Brooklyn street names, Flushing Avenue replaced earlier routes, among them the Brooklyn and Newtown Turnpike Road.