current crimes
There’s always the 7 train.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Owing to the sudden departure of my mac, and the associated digital tumult, these shots are a few weeks old, so apologies. This seems to be the way my life operates – just when I managed to get a healthy rhythm going after the smashed toe drama ended, another disaster occurs. One should be out and about this evening, recording the sort of amazing landscape which Western Queens offers, but as far as right now and today goes – it’s a few archive shots of the 7 train coming and going in LIC.
Above, a Manhattan bound train is descending into the Hunters Point Avenue station off of the steel causeway that carries it over the Sunnyside Yards and the MTA’s Arch Street train maintenance facility.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Also at the Hunters Point 7 station, this IRT Flushing line train is Queens bound, and was the one which a humble narrator boarded on his way to Queensboro Plaza. Let’s face it, there’s a lot of “math” we New Yorkers do when using the MTA system. The particular equation one such as myself often calculates, which should simply be about the fastest way home, factors in “pain in the ass” variables. I will avoid a transfer at Herald Square at all costs, for instance, as the station sits on a hellmount. That’s why it’s always so hot there.
On this particular afternoon, sometime last month as I recall, I had just conducted a walking tour of Skillman Avenue for a group of Sunnyside Yards Deck opponents. It was fairly chilly out, and the 7 would carry me to Queensboro Plaza where I could transfer to an N line train which would turn up 31st street and deposit me on Broadway. A short walk would then find me walking in the door to HQ. I could have ridden the 7 out to Jackson Heights, and transferred at Roosevelt Avenue to an R train which would stop a few blocks closer to HQ, but that could have ended up being a “pain in the ass.” Especially so on the weekends.
Remember, the “A” in MTA is for “adventure.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Beside the “pain” factor, one of my absolute favorite shots in the entire subway system is that of the 7 pulling into Queensboro Plaza with the Silvercup Bakeries sign behind it. What’s a ten block walk as compared to a two block walk when there’s a photo worth taking involved with the former?
Pfagh.
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Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
The Newtown Pentacle 
Then you might like this little painting: https://www.sethtane.com/work/silvercup-7
Hope your-old-as-mine Mac is happily resurrected !
Seth Tane
March 5, 2020 at 4:38 pm
Seth…..What a beautiful piece of work! I had to look carefully to see that it wasn’t a photograph.
Good Luck!
Bobby bridgeman
bobbybridgeman
March 6, 2020 at 8:59 pm
Thanks Bobby, hope you’re safe & healthy in these crazy times !
Seth Tane
August 30, 2020 at 12:45 pm