Archive for the ‘newtown creek’ Category
slippery thumping
A few more from DUPBO, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Recent endeavor found one beneath the Pulaski Bridge in LIC during a warm evening. Other photos from this series were presented last week, but for one reason or another I never showed these three off as I’ve been distracted by something closer to home and by a few medical issues. The big “project” for the last week has involved the fact that for once the City has brought the show to my own front door here in Astoria, but more on that one later in the week. Instead, here’s a few “purty” night shots.
Also, I published the wrong date for this week’s “Infrastructure Creek” walk yesterday, it’s Wednesday night rather than Thursday, and links to it are at the bottom of the post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A humble narrator is already having a pretty odd week, it should be offered. It’s been decided that I’m actually going to use my health insurance rather than just having it, and a process has begun wherein I’m going to have diagnosticians examine all of the major systems which I’m in possession of. Yesterday, a Doctor and her team used microscopes to look at the entirety of my skinvelope, for instance. Made it through more or less intact, with the exception of having liquid nitrogen sprayed on a “thing” on the bridge of my nose and a scalpel carving a second but quite different “thing” off my left arm which was sent for laboratory analysis.
She wasn’t too concerned about either “thing,” the Doctor wasn’t. She kept on trying to assuage any fear I might have, whereupon I explained that what concerns me most is uncertainty. I don’t mind the proverbial sword of Damocles if I know about it, what drives me nuts is suspecting that the thing might be hanging over me and that I don’t know what to expect or prepare for. Optometrist is next, then I’ll move over to all the internals. Hoping someone can find that matchbox car I lost when I was five.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The big show that the City has brought to Astoria is a repaving project on Broadway, which has been an absolutely glorious display of millions of dollars of esoteric machinery being operated by large crews of night shift construction workers. I’m trying to figure out the right and most efficient way to show the operation, since as you’d imagine, I’ve shot hundreds of photos of the operation that’s playing out right under my bedroom windows.
Meantime, why not grab a ticket for tomorrow night’s Infrastructure Creek walk? It’s underwritten by Newtown Creek Alliance, so the ticket price is only $12!
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Upcoming Tours and Events
RESCHEDULED FROM LAST WEEK DUE TO WEATHER
Wednesday, July 17, 7 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.
“Infrastructure Creek” Walking Tour w Newtown Creek Alliance
If you want infrastructure, then meet NCA historian Mitch Waxman at the corner of Greenpoint Avenue and Kingsland Avenue in Brooklyn, and in just one a half miles he’ll show you the largest and newest of NYC’s 14 sewer plants, six bridges, a Superfund site, three rail yards with trains moving at street grade (which we will probably encounter at a crossing), a highway that carries 32 million vehicle trips a year 106 feet over water. The highway feeds into the Queens Midtown Tunnel, and we’ll end it all at the LIC ferry landing where folks are welcome to grab a drink and enjoy watching the sunset at the East River, as it lowers behind the midtown Manhattan skyline.
Click here for ticketing and more information.
Thursday, July 25, 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.
Greenpoint Walking Tour w NYCH20
Explore Greenpoint’s post industrial landscape and waterfront with Newtown Creek Alliance historian Mitch Waxman.
Click here for ticketing and more information.
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.
stout pillars
DUPBO, Down Under the Pulaski Bridge Onramp.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
To begin with, when I was on site in Long Island City’s DUPBO section shooting these photos the other night, something so unique and novel occurred that I’m doubting the experience, so I’m going to be heading back sometime over the next few days when it’s light out to “get scientific” about the matter, and I’ll report it to you after a second observation and proper photo cataloguing but for now let’s just leave it hanging.
Mundane and material, that’s a late model Long Island Railroad engine sitting on a siding of the Lower Montauk tracks, awaiting orders.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This is the spot I was in when the weird thing happened, a location I found myself in due to the attentions of an over zealous and probably bored security guard who decided that my activities were impeding on the grounds she protects. I wish she’d spend some time on the illegal dumping, homeless camps, or the flotilla of RV’s serving as domiciles here in DUPBO, but focusing in on middle aged men with cameras and tripods standing in a parking lot is clearly at the top of her threat chart.
This shot is looking northwards, towards the LIE and Queens Midtown Tunnel.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Shlepping towards HQ, and exiting the industrial area in pursuit of getting to the train station, the 19th avenue footbridge carried me over the LIRR tracks leading from Hunters Point into the Sunnyside Yards and then under the Long Island Expressway. This is quite a well used footpath, as a note, which connects Borden Avenue with 49th or Hunters Point Avenue where a stop on the #7 train can be accessed.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Upcoming Tours and Events
Thursday, July 11, 7 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.
“Infrastructure Creek” Walking Tour w Newtown Creek Alliance
If you want infrastructure, then meet NCA historian Mitch Waxman at the corner of Greenpoint Avenue and Kingsland Avenue in Brooklyn, and in just one a half miles he’ll show you the largest and newest of NYC’s 14 sewer plants, six bridges, a Superfund site, three rail yards with trains moving at street grade (which we will probably encounter at a crossing), a highway that carries 32 million vehicle trips a year 106 feet over water. The highway feeds into the Queens Midtown Tunnel, and we’ll end it all at the LIC ferry landing where folks are welcome to grab a drink and enjoy watching the sunset at the East River, as it lowers behind the midtown Manhattan skyline.
Click here for ticketing and more information.
Saturday, July 13, 10 a.m. – 12 p.m.
“Exploring the East River, From General Slocum Disaster
to Abandoned Islands” Boat Tour w NY Adventure Club
Onboard a Soundview route NYC Ferry – Join New York Adventure Club for a two-part aquatic adventure as we explore the General Slocum disaster, and historic sights and stories along the East River, all by NYC Ferry.
Click here for ticketing and more information.
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.
obviously recent
End to end, and where your poop goes, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s a view of the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant over in Greenpoint, the newest and largest of NYC’s 14 sewer plants. The eight egg shaped structures which define the facility are bio digesters. What that means is that they contain cultures, in industrial amounts, of the same bacteria that the human gut carries. After undergoing several stages of filtration – mechanical, aeration, and so on – NYC’s brew of sewage and storm water is pumped into those eggs whereupon the bacteria go to work. The micro critters consume what’s left of nutrients in the “honey” (which is how the wastewater engineers of the DEP refer to the stuff) and both the digestive process and their biologies sterilize the stuff. The DEP spends a lot of time making sure that the environment inside the eggs is conducive to this biological action, which includes maintaining a constant interior temperature that matches that of the human body.
It seems that we humans have a remarkably inefficient gut, which is why we fart when consuming too much food. So too, does the sewer plant get gassy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Those four cylinders burn off the waste gases produced within the eggs, which largely take the form of Methane. As this turns the sewer plant in Greenpoint into one of the largest point sources of “greenhouse gases” in NYC, the DEP is working with the National Grid company in pursuance of harvesting the methane, which would be chemically modified a tad and added to National Grid’s “natural gas” supply and sold to customers. One is fairly familiar with both this partnership and the process, and the wheelings and dealings behind it, and it’s pretty problematic.
The alternative, however, is to do nothing and continue pumping millions of tons of methane into the atmosphere annually.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Over in Manhattan, at the corner of East 13th and Avenue D, is the Manhattan Pump House. If you’re in the City and flush a toilet anywhere south of 79th street, your “product” is coming here. I’ve been inside this structure, which plunges multiple stories down into the ground (it’s actually deeper than it is tall). All of the “flow” goes into that cylindrical structure on the left side of the facility, which is called a “surge tower.” There’s a black maelstrom visible from the catwalk, which spirals down into a pipe laid across the bottom of the East River and then eastwards deep under Greenpoint and to the plant.
So, that’s where your poop goes.
“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.
reluctant glimpse
Tomorrow, tomorrow… it’s only…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The weather has a humble narrator down, man. This constancy of daily thunderstorms has really thrown a wrench into the works, and I find myself wistfully thinking of the anthem from the Broadway Musical “Annie” – tomorrow, there’ll be sun… its only a day away. Problem is that “tomorrow never comes,” which leads me from Broadway hopefulness back to mid 1980’s punk. We haven’t seen the sun in so long at this point that mushrooms are growing on my back. I don’t even want to think about the conditions on my beloved Newtown Creek at this point, which must be historically swollen with sewage runoff by now.
Is it just me, or has this been the wettest couple of months in the last twenty years?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
All of this weather has really gotten in the way of things for me. I’m not entirely sure that you haven’t seen at least one of the shots in today’s post before, which is symptomatic of some of the dramatic issues thrown down in recent weeks by the various service providers used for delivering the blog. The whole flickr issue has been nothing but a pain in the neck, and I’m quite resentful of having to fork over a bunch of money to the site host in return for them not populating my posts with lowest common denominator advertising. The final straw on that front was the arrival of one of those javascript traps you commonly see at the NY Post website that takes over the screen and is designed to ensure that you have to click on it to get your screen back.
Congratulations, Apple user, you’ve won the day.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The forecast for the weekend seems to be looking up, however, so perhaps Annie is wiser than you’d normally expect. One plans on being “out there,” as I have no obligations other than to myself for a few days. I’m anxious to get out in the dark with the tripod as well, and resume the night photography work.
“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.
curious designs
Jarring, ain’t it?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One thing I love about traveling around NYC on the water is the perspective offered. When you’re on the streets, alleys, or highways of the megalopolis it’s hard to see the big picture. The fact that the Real Estate Industrial Complex has never managed to convince the Mayors of NYC to pave over the rivers (the developers have tried, several times over the centuries, as a note, and have occasionally succeeded as with “Battery Park City”) allows the opportunity to observe the changing skyline. In the last twenty years, there’s been so much change – both by unfortunate circumstance as in the case of the Freedom Tower World Trade Center above, or through avarice as in the case of that weird apartment building with the leaky windows situated just to the right of it.
Before you ask… there was a plan floated in the 1930’s to pave over the Hudson and create an airport. The fellow running the design process for the quixotic Sunnyside Yards deck proposed filing in the East River between Lower Manhattan and Governor’s Island during the Bloomberg years in pursuance of creating a new neighborhood called “Lolo,” and the current Mayor of NYC wants to expand Manhattan into the Hudson and East River by about a half mile in the name of climate resiliency. A protective wall of condominiums to protect the Financial District.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The skyline of LIC is one of the most altered places in the entire City. Ten years ago, when I started consciously documenting the place, there were four large residential buildings in Hunters Point, and there was the Citibank Sapphire Megalith. Today, it’s hard to point out the megalith to passerby, as it’s been obscured in its primacy by new construction. There’s no talk, yet, of expanding the land into the water in LIC, but that’s because a compliant political establishment here in Queens welcomes the presence of Real Estate Industrial Complex activity in upland properties. Keep an eye on Northern Blvd. between Steinway Street and Woodside Avenue in the coming years.
Just the other night, somebody I know who’s a “player” here in Queens was opining that the recent alteration in rent regulations law that occurred in Albany signaled the end of big development and an impending cessation of new construction. He said that “all the big projects are going to stop, and the developers would be pulling out of preexisting arrangements.” Pfah.
As if.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Personally, I look forward to some future era when it doesn’t rain every day – but I find it difficult to believe that after expensively manipulating the City Planning process, and striking deals with every donation hungry advocacy and political organization you can imagine, paying architects and engineers – you’d pull out of the chance to reap the dreams of avarice. You invest a dollar in pursuance of it turning into a thousand dollars overnight, and then pull away from the deal because you’re only going to make $999 off the project?
There’s no crying in baseball.
“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 