Archive for the ‘newtown creek’ Category
DUGSBO & the plank road gooses
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Welcome to the start of ‘Day three’ on a recent trip ‘back to the old neighborhood’ and my first stop after leaving Hank the Elevator Guy’s crib in Middle Village was DUGSBO – Down Under the Grand Street Bridge Onramp. You have to call a place something, and ‘White’s Dock’ as a place name is historical trivia recognized by maybe two or three living humans, one of whom is likely the webmaster at Forgotten-NY.
Long ago, I decided to just start calling unnamed places ‘something’ and enjoyed the conceit of using the model for ‘DUMBO’ for these otherwise uncommented upon spots. That’s the Grand Street Bridge pictured above.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I scuttled out onto the Grand Street Bridge, and straddled the currently undefended border of Brooklyn and Queens. The NYC Department of Environmental Protection dumps so much untreated sewage into this section of the creek that a judge ordered them to do something about the low oxygen levels therein. Rather than stem or divert the flow of ‘honey’ to their outfalls, the DEP built an aeration system instead. It’s a bit like an enormous aquarium bubble wand, one that also transports bottom sediments to the surface where they can aerosolize. The judge told them oxygenation needs to be solved…
Yeah, it’s all Exxon’s fault, just ask the DEP – they’ll tell you all about Exxon and how everything wrong with Newtown Creek is because of Exxon and the millions of gallons of raw sewage they release here annually isn’t a problem.
Here’s today’s: Bah!
– photo by Mitch Waxman
If failure had an icon, it would involve this aeration system.
One of the problems with the generation coming up is that if a group of governmental employees appeared who called themselves ‘The Good Guys, Girls, and everyone else who’s good too crew,’ it would come as a surprise to most of the youngins when they found out that this outfit were eugenicists or something. Just because it’s government doesn’t mean it’s good, and just because it’s corporate it’s not guaranteed bad. My advice is to be suspicious of everybody and everything until they prove themselves trustworthy. How’s that for ‘thought leading’?
Please, please, please… judge things by what they are rather than what you hope they’ll be. Evidence! Patterns! Do they do what they say they do?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Next stop was the Maspeth Avenue Plank Road, long described as ‘my happy place.’ I sat down for a bit, as it was ludicrously tropical out weather wise. That’s when I started noticing movement all around me.
It was them, one of the menaces which have long bedeviled me around Newtown Creek – in fact for decades now.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of these malfeasants captured my attention when swimming right past me, waggling its tail provocatively while doing so. It maintained eye contact, and so did I. It’s a Dinosaur, sort of.
This was all a deception.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Another one of their cohort was circling around and trying to get behind me, so I stood up and shouted ‘NAAAG,’ as I speak a kind of goose.
These Canada Gooses are far and away one of the nastiest sort of Dino-Birds you can meet. I once got into a fist fight with one at Calvary Cemetery, and all these years later I’m still dealing with the blowback. (The Audubon Society people didn’t like my related tale of fighting a goose, as a note, but that ‘icehole’ started it. I finished it. Brooklyn!)
NAAAG!
I packed up my camera bag, bid these objectionable swamp chickens ‘adieu,’ and continued along my way. Very cheeky behavior for critters who don’t seem to have any cheeks, if you ask me…
Back tomorrow.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
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“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.
Old friends
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One was finishing out the second day of shooting on a recent trip back home to NYC, but I had to make a late afternoon stop at the Hunters Point Avenue Bridge – spanning the Dutch Kills tributary of the fabulous Newtown Creek – to see my little tree of heaven.
Long time readers may recall that charting the growth of this tree became something of an obsession for me during the Covid lockdowns.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It’s officially a Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima), and it has been sprouting out from under that factory for a few years now. They make lady’s face paint and other cosmetic goo in there, I’m told.
My efforts were nearly over, having got started at about seven in the morning. I still had some socializing to experience later on.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One last shot, and I summoned a rideshare to carry my carcass from Dutch Kills in LIC over to Woodside. I did think about just taking the train, but that was at least a twenty minute walk from this spot and frankly – I was fairly exhausted at this particular moment.
The car came, and the air conditioning within was quite a relief after an entire day of being out in the heat and carrying all of my possessions around. I was still shlepping a bag of clothing around with me, after all.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Next stop was, as mentioned, in Woodside. The plan was to meet up with some of my knuckleheads at Donovan’s Pub for burgers and beers. I was early, and didn’t want to ‘get started’ by myself, so I headed over to the noisome little triangle park found at the corner of Roosevelt and 58th to wait out a half hour interval.
I affixed the wide angle 16mm lens to the camera, and tried to ignore the guy who was washing a slash wound to his hand in a water fountain. Dude had a lot of gravy inside him, and left a bunch of it painted onto that fountain.
This is why Queens can’t have anything nice.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Old number seven was rampaging through every ten minutes or so, high above on the green steel. Everything was madness, and noise, and chaos, and punctuated by automobile horns. As mentioned several times, my environmental adaptations to NYC seem to have worn off. It’s been a while since I’ve heard anything quite like this and it was overwhelming.
I don’t want you to think I’ve gone soft in Pennsylvania, instead my brain no longer spends quite as much time pruning and selecting sensory data as it used to back in NYC. In Astoria, for instance, I learned that I could sleep through an automatic weapons long barrel gunfight that was happening directly below my bedroom window.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After dinner, the group split up, and I left with Hank the Elevator guy. I’d be staying at Casa Del Hank in Middle Village for the remainder of my trip. We got back to his place, hung out for a bit, and I was soon passed out in his spare room. Day three of this trip was going to be a real lulu.
Back tomorrow.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
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.
Estate Reality, Dutch Kills
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
To catch you up, a humble narrator was visiting home recently, discovered that his long held environmental adaptations to NYC had faded away and could thereby fully smell and hear literally everything, and it was a particularly hot and humid day when these shots were gathered.
One was scuttling about in Long Island City, and standing on Borden Avenue’s eponymous bridge, which is found along the 1870’s vintage roadway. That’s the Queens Midtown Expressway section of the larger Long Island Expressway pictured above, as seen from Borden Avenue.
Formerly, the highway truss was the largest structure you’d find along the Dutch Kills tributary of the Newtown Creek, spanned by both the LIE and the very same Borden Avenue Bridge (amongst others) that I was standing upon.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Across the water, an enormous construction project has been undertaken, a ‘last mile warehouse’ operation dubbed as the ‘Review Avenue Complex’ by its developer, which promises thirty six loading bays for semi trucks, and one hundred and eighteen parking spots for other semis waiting to deliver their cargo. While you’ve all been fighting about bike lanes, this is what the powers that be snuck past you. It’s almost as if the bike lanes are a distraction…
This is a massive cargo depot, basically, built next to a freight rail line and an industrial canal, and which is entirely truck based. Big trucks will drive through your neighborhood to get here and deliver their cargo, and then little trucks will then drive through your neighborhood to deliver the ‘stuff.’ If the project is successful, heavy truck traffic will thereby increase in the residential neighborhoods surrounding Newtown Creek..
Congratulations, Queens. You’ve done it again. Think bike lanes, instead. It’s because of the bike lanes… the traffic… those pesky bike lanes.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of the more annoying parts of the EPA Superfund team’s ’modus operandi’ at Newtown Creek is that they claim that land usage decisions are completely out of their jurisdiction, even if what gets built is going to affect their remediation efforts down the line.
Fascinating how you can base the very definition of a polluting industry here, at a Federal Superfund site, and receive zero regulatory attention. Why not open that factory which burns truck tires that I always joke about, or just open up an asphalt recycling plant downwind from a dense residential population? What could go wrong?
This is the part of today’s post where I say it: ‘Bah!’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This shot is out of sequence, and was gathered on the day after the particular walk that took me to Dutch Kills. while walking over the Kosciuszcko Bridge (we’ll talk about that leg later on). The shocking scale of the Review Avenue Complex (the one on the right) is softened only slightly by a similarly gigantic project (left) that has also risen from Borden Avenue and is on the former site of the FreshDirect outfit. That project is for theatrical production, I’m told.
Neither structure existed before I left NYC at the end of 2022.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A concrete pumping truck which adjures passerby to get ‘All aboard the Gravy Train’ on its side kind of sums up what I think about all of this. Good to see that the shit flies of the real estate industry still swarm and flock, here in the world’s borough.
The good news is that hundreds of construction workers are collecting a check, but seriously – where is the City and the EDC here? Green roof? Connections to bulk cargo shipping opportunities of rail or barge? Any sort of environmental anything? How’s about a place to sit down, at least? A bus shelter? Anything?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Not my problem anymore, thought a humble narrator.
I turned a corner, and walked past the former campus of Irving Subway Grate, which has been converted over into a waterfront facing concrete factory, after sitting fallow for decades. The water on the other side of the factory is Dutch Kills, if you’re curious. Literally the worst thing to site near a waterway is a concrete factory, especially if they’re not using their docks to move feed stocks in. Weather inevitably scrapes the piles of feed stocks and carries them into the water, where they coat the bottom of the waterway.
Ok, one more time: Bah!
Back tomorrow.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
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.
DULIE 2025
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Down Under the Long Island Expressway, aka the Borden Avenue Street End in Queens’ Long Island City.
This spot was the scene of an traffic accident during the Covid lockdowns which involved three fellows, who drove through this section at an outrageous speed – according to the NYPD – and their car ended up submerged in the waters of Newtown Creek’s Dutch Kills tributary. The experience was fatal for the trio, and the powers that be decided to close off this dead end section of Borden Avenue to traffic. A group of skaters then turned the street into an ad hoc skate park, and a couple of guys I know started to work on reconditioning the street end itself. I should mention that there’s people living in shipping containers which are found on the other side of that fencing under the LIE, as that’s an important fact to know, somehow.
After having walked from Hunters Point to Blissville with a couple of the new people at Newtown Creek Alliance, this was my next stop.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
They’ve been busy.
This used to be a location that you’d need to hold thorny branches back to access, and it was a favorite location for illegal dumping. It’s kind of welcoming, nowadays, and I took the opportunity to enjoy the shade offered by the LIE and chill out for a few minutes.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The tripod was deployed, as was a neutral density filter. I hadn’t gotten ‘artsy fartsy’ yet on this trip, and felt the desire to do a few long exposures of Dutch Kills. Man, I’ve spent a lot of time along this waterway. I always thought that the Brooklyn side of the Creek had lots of people keeping an eye out, whereas Queens only had me. Good to see that new people are taking ownership here. It’s about time, actually.
I hung around a little while. My next meetup wasn’t for a couple of hours, so I had some time to kill and just one more ‘have to’ for this day.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
An emotional journey is what I was on, it should be mentioned.
Memories, recollections, bitter remembrances. I thought about all of my dead friends, and a few of the living ones. I called Our Lady of the Pentacle, who is back in Pittsburgh with Moe the Dog, and caught her up with my where’s and when’s. All the while – click, whirr, click, whirr.
The smell, though. The noise. As mentioned previously, my environmental adaptations have fallen away. I was experiencing NYC, from a sensory point of view, in the manner that an outsider does. Shocking coruscations of sound and smell abounded.
I don’t think I miss New York City all that much.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My next stop was on the other side of the Hunters Point Avenue Bridge, pictured above. Long time readers will be able to guess what I wanted to see over in that direction. My tree of heaven.
We’ll get there soon enough.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Jesus Christ, you turn a corner and BAM, there it is again. The wall of blue glass erected in the last 20 years. When I met up with the fellows from NCA, one of the first things I mentioned was the stolen sky. LIC used to be ‘big sky’ territory with nary a building over four stories tall. The vault of heaven has been privatized, however, and only the lonely can remember the old days in LIC.
Back next week with more from the fabulous Newtown Creek.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
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.
DUGABO awaits
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This post begins in DUPBO, or ‘Down Under the Pulaski Bridge Onramp,’ and ends in DUGABO – ‘Down Under the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge.’ I’ve caught a lot of crap from the mouth breather crowd over in Maspeth for these terms over the years, but there you are. ‘Eff’ them. You have to refer to ‘zones’ along the Newtown Creek somehow, with some sort of geographical reference for an otherwise fairly unfamiliar area.
As mentioned in prior posts, I was walking with a couple of the ‘new guys’ at Newtown Creek Alliance, chatting and telling stories. Sometimes histories instead of tales, but I was trying to pass on my legendarily combative view of the Creek situation to them.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the view of the fairly ancient Long Island Railroad yard at Hunters Point, which dates back to 1870. As mentioned in a prior posts, the MTA seems to have found the funding to build a flood wall around the facility. It’s as ugly and ‘anti street’ as they could possibly manage.
This is the part of today’s post where I say ‘Bah!’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Greenpoint Avenue Bridge, at Railroad Avenue and Van Dam Street in Blissville, that’s what the picture above delivers. We walked down to Railroad Avenue, and since leaving NYC I’ve discovered that almost every major city in the United States has a ‘Railroad Avenue.’ Universally, they all suck as far as being dirty and the place where polluting industries like waste transfer stations ot asphalt and concrete factories set up. I mean, this is logical, given that ‘Railroad Avenue’ has rail tracks.
At Newtown Creek, in the Blissville section of Long Island City, only Waste Management regularly uses the rail – everything else here is truck based.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’ll be talking about that giant monster of a last mile warehouse facility that’s going up along Dutch Kills in a subsequent post, but I’ve included this shot just to bring home the scale of the structure. Huge!
Is it connected to the industrial canal it sits alongside? Is it connected to the freight tracks which it neighbors? What exactly does the NYC Economic Development Corporation do, other than letting developers run amok with no requirements or ‘buy ins’ so as to not be the worst possible neighbors?
I’m told there’s going to be six active loading bays within the building, with exterior truck parking that can accomodate 118 semis. Y’all do know that semis don’t turn off their engines while waiting for a chance to deliver cargo, right? That at any given moment there will be at least a hundred heavy trucks just sitting there and idling alongside the Long Island Expressway? That there is no way for those trucks to get here without traveling through Sunnyside, Woodside, Astoria, Maspeth, Ridgewood, or Greenpoint? That one maritime barge would carry the equivalent cargo of 38 of those trucks? It isn’t bike lanes that are causing the traffic to increase by about 5% per year.
Ok, twice today – ‘Bah!”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The two fellows from NCA had to head back to HQ, at 520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint, and get back to work saving the world. Me? I had something that I wanted to see, so I headed back into Queens and in the direction of the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek.
Evening would find me in Woodside meeting up with that crew of knuckleheads whom I call friends, but the afternoon still held a few destinations which I wanted to get shots of.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I wasn’t wearing the NCA hat which was a standard part of my ‘uniform’ all those years. Instead I had on the flash orange ball cap which I’ve taken to wearing in Pennsylvania, as I often find myself walking in woodlands and don’t want to get shot at by hunters. At least, any more than is necessary.
Back tomorrow.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
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 