Archive for the ‘Philadelphia’ Category
jump downward
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One arrived back at where my day had truly begun – Philadelphia’s 30th street Station, with a good 40-50 minutes to spare before my trip on Amtrak back to NYC was scheduled to occur.
I set myself up for a few long exposure shots while I was waiting, using the “Ultrapod” camera support system which is little bit less conspicuous than the tripod is.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The junkies of Philadelphia seem to gather here at night, which is something I observed the last time I was passing through. These are “professional junkies,” sly and scheming creatures of the street who see everyone – including their own – through a lens of exploitation. If they thought they could get away with killing you and then boiling the body down to sell off the elements you’re composed of, they would.
While marinating in a paranoid 360 degree hyper awareness of my surroundings, and tracking every living human within ten steps of my immediate location, I got busy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
You can say what you want, and be as free thinking and liberal as you desire to be, but where that shit all falls apart is on the street. If you don’t spend time on the streets alone at night, just shut up, you don’t understand what you’re talking about.
There were a lot of eyes watching me. Two or three different people approached, asking for change or whatever. They weren’t interested in coinage, rather they were sizing me up to see what they could get away with. Of course, these junkies are from Philadelphia. I, on the other hand, am from Brooklyn. For one such as myself, all I have to do is stare deeply into their eyes and repeat whatever they say to me back at them in a loud monotone, and they soon realize that there is easier prey which will be found elsewhere.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’m not saying that I’m some sort of tough guy, incidentally. I’m not. However, the Brooklyn way is the Brooklyn way, and this is freaking Philadelphia – America’s consolation prize. The city you remember to mention after you’ve rolled through San Diego, Minneapolis, and Denver. Christ, I think Toronto is a tougher town than Phillie is.
Freaking junkies…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Finally, it was time to head down to the tracks, and Amtrak arrived only about five minutes late. I was tired, having woken up at 4:45 a.m. and spent the day marching about while operating the camera.
Other than the thunderstorms which had arrived in Philadelphia about 5:30 p.m. following me home, the trip was uneventful.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
We got to NYC more or less on time, and a quick breath of maskless air was gulped on 8th Avenue before I boarded a Queens bound E train. A quick transfer at Queens Plaza soon saw me scuttling about in Astoria.
Our Lady of the Pentacle had made a lasagna, and a hearty meal greeted me back at HQ. Next week – something different, at this – your Newtown Pentacle.
“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.
dancing forms
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The return to 30th Street Station section of my March 7th trip to Philadelphia took the form of a “photowalk” rather than the sort of “composed” photos which I’d been capturing most of the day. What that means is that I had a vague idea of where my destination was, but no route. This carried me through several mixed use and residential neighborhoods along the way.
Looks a lot like Bushwick used to look like, I thought.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Disturbingly, observed evidence along my route suggested that I’m not the only resident of Queens to have visited Philadelphia recently.
Could the Queens Cobbler be operating here as well? Is this where the Cobbler disappeared to during the pandemic months? Can’t be…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The fires of gentrification, fueled by locally grown wood and spewing artisinal smoke, burn hotly in Philadelphia – I’m told. Real Estate, real estate. Notice the signage on this construction project promising “Luxury Living” alongside the elevated expressway.
What a view, huh?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Ok, this was when it started to get weird. It can’t be, can it?
Given that it was “rush hour” while I was heading to the presumptive west, I just kept on walking.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s lovely historic architecture everywhere you look in Philadelphia. Again, one of the weird things for me as a New Yorker was a paucity of street level shops. No bodegas to be found, but I did eventually find a 711 storefront, where I snagged a coffee and a bottle of Gatorade to boost my fading energy. All told, according to the phone, I had covered about ten miles over the course of the day. A tiny corner of a huge city.
Scuttling, forever scuttling, I continued on my way.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
What the hell, Philadelphia?
The Queens Cobbler and I seem to haunt the same corridors.
“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.
cloudless peak
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The long heralded storm which had been forecast to hit Philadelphia in the late afternoon finally set up, and whereas a humble narrator had an umbrella attached to his pack – shelter was required. Right alongside the Benjamin Franklin Bridge is the Cherry Street Pier (Municipal Pier No. 9), which is a former maritime industrial doohickey that has been converted over to public open space usage. They have caged artists in residency there, and they imprison them on display in converted shipping containers, no doubt to keep their intellectual contagion from infecting the youth.
When researching the trip, I had spotted this facility, and knowing that thunderstorms were forecast, was ready to duck in there for some cover. It was neat, and my “just in case” plan was successful. Another bit of advice for the traveling photographer – always have a “rain plan” you can alter your course into.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Back to photographing the colossal Benjamin Franklin Bridge, for me, thereby. The roof is missing on the section of the pier I was on, but there was just enough up there to mostly vouchsafe the camera and lens from getting “spotted” by raindrops.
My ambitious shot list for the day in Philadelphia had already been heavily redacted, and most of what I had to drop wasn’t terribly exciting – touristy shots of the historic districts where, you know, the United States was imagined and drawn up. Liberty Bell, etc.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The one thing I regretted having to drop, due to weather and time, was walking up onto the Benjamin Franklin Bridge’s pedestrian path and blasting out a few photos from the prominence. As mentioned – Thunderstorms – and a humble narrator doesn’t mess with high wind and lightning if he has a choice.
Next time, I guess. The Port Authority’s website offers fairly explicit instructions for photographers who want to shoot from on high, and suggests introducing yourself to the security personnel at the entrance to the pedestrian path before heading up there.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Since I was sheltered from the worst of the rain on the pier, advantage was taken. That’s the Delaware River, with New Jersey’s Camden waterfront on the horizon. It seems that wherever New Jersey touches the major city of another state, there’s a pretty awful circumstance. Newark in the north, Camden in the south. Newark is comparatively a paradise as opposed to its southern counterpart, I’m told.
My time in Philadelphia was growing short, and it was nearly time to begin heading back towards the 30th street Station to catch an Amtrak train back to “home sweet hell.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Across the river, and I had to use a super zoom lens for this one, the Battleship New Jersey operates as a museum vessel. Couldn’t avoid taking this shot, despite the conditions.
A general reordering of the camera bag(s) occurred at this point. My current system involves carrying a backpack with foam inserts to protect the gear, and attached to its exterior are my tripod and an umbrella. I also carry a messenger style sling bag on my hip which is similarly outfitted with foam inserts. In general, I carry four lenses on these sorts of excursions. Two of them, the zoom lenses, are “daylight” oriented. The other two are prime lenses, and are “lowlight” specialists. There’s a whole lot of other crap in the bags – batteries, a loop of paracord, gaff tape, gum – all sorts of stuff I might need or want.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The lenses I’m using circumstantially and in the moment – zooms for daylight, for instance – are carried in the sling for easy access. When the circumstance changes, so does the carrying order. The zooms go into the backpack, and the low light primes come out. One is on the camera, the other in the sling bag. When you walk as much as I do, even a single pound of weight in the camera bag can slow you down incrementally, and by photographer standards – my kit is a wonder of efficiency.
Don’t forget, with the exception of an hour in the late afternoon when I had a meal, I had been in continuous motion since 7:30 a.m. The shot above was captured at 5:22 p.m. My return trip to NYC was scheduled to leave at 8:01 p.m. Given that I was in unfamiliar territory, and definitely wanted to arrive in advance of the train, my toes were pointed away from the river and back towards Center City.
Seriously, why don’t these cheesesteak eaters just call it freaking “downtown?”
“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.
long before
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On my way to a restaurant nearby Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, one scuttled through an apparent historic district filled with homes of taste and substance. Several monumental religious structures were also encountered, but given that it had been about seven hours since I’d had a drink of water or anything to eat…
You have to be careful when you’re out doing an all day photowalk in unfamiliar territory. Drink too much, you end up having to piss. When you don’t know the “rules” for where you are, watering the bushes can result in an encounter with the cops. Thereby, it’s smart to restrict the amount of liquid you take in, since it diminishes the amount you then release back into the wild. This can backfire, of course, and sometimes I end up parched. I generally don’t carry bottles of liquid with me, since electronics and water don’t get along well, and water is heavy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My shot list, which was extensive and ambitious to say the least, was roughly half accomplished at this stage. I found a cool bar/restaurant called “Jack’s Firehouse” directly across the street from the penitentiary, and got there just as it started to rain. I guzzled water, had a pint or two of Yuengling, and ate an amazing bbq brisket sandwich with sides. The staff had just finished their lunch time rush and thereby I received a lot of attention due to the camera equipment, and the series of garrulous personality quirks which I’m famous for.
My server was a young woman who was native to the area, and she filled me in on the stratified socio economic situation here in Philadelphia, her experiences with the de facto “red line” segregation of the city, and also laid out a general nativist point of view on the place which was illuminating. Not the sort of stuff that makes the tourist brochures.
Necessity being the mother of all invention, I also broke one of my core rules and thereby – it was me – I was the guy who took a dump in a bar’s bathroom. Don’t worry, I flushed. Having blown my ballast, refueled, and with a couple of drinks in me – back onto the mean streets of Philly did I scuttle.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Now, during the meal, I had whipped out my notebook and began crossing things off of the shot list. One knew it was impossible to accomplish everything I had sketched into my day before I got off the train – “no Liberty Bell for me,” said I – but given the early arrival of inclement weather ahead of its forecasted interval, I had to adjust.
A quick cab ride saw me heading from the Eastern State Penitentiary area to the shoreline of the Delaware River, and the Benjamin Franklin Bridge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Benjamin Franklin Bridge is a monster. In terms of massing and scale, this 1926 suspension bridge is reminiscent of the sort of spans you’d commonly observe in a certain superior City found to the north of Philadelphia. It must have been New Jersey’s influence on the Philadelphia people which caused them to reach higher than they normally do.
The rain was spotty, no more than an occasional drizzle at this particular point. My original intention had been to surmount the thing, which overflies the Delaware River. The rain – which was the first indication of an oncoming storm – changed my mind on that one. Instead, I poked around on shore, looking for places where the bridge’s ramps would provide me with a “rain shadow.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Originally built as the “Delaware River Bridge,” this giant is owned and operated by the Delaware River Port Authority of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The span was designated as a “historic place” in 2003, and began to be called the “Benjamin Franklin Bridge over the Delaware River” in 1955. It carries about a hundred thousand vehicle trips a day between Philadelphia and Camden, NJ. There’s 7 lanes of Interstate 676 and US 30 high speed traffic, two bike and pedestrian paths, and a mass transit service that runs on converted street car track ways called the PATCO Speedline. “PATCO” stands for Port Authority Transit Corporation.
The bridge overflies the water at 135.1 feet, has a total length of 9,573 feet, and it’s towers are 385 feet high. The bridge engineer for this gargantua was Leon Moiseff, designer of the superior Manhattan Bridge, found over the far better East River, in a more impressive City called New York.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
While hiding from precipitant in the rain shadow of the thing, I spotted a lone tugboat navigating along the Delaware River. Fun!
More 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.
mute granite
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A pre dawn Amtrak ride, some 90 minutes in length, had delivered a scuttling horror – familiar to NYC – to the banks of the Schuylkill River in the city of Philadelphia. America’s consolation prize didn’t disappoint, and a humble narrator had spent a very productive morning and early afternoon photographing the bridges spanning the banks of the Schuylkill and working through an extensive shot list. My last stop along the Schuylkill River Trail is pictured above – the Fairmount Water Works.
This operation was designed in 1812 and principally installed between 1812 and 1815, with work continuing at the site until 1872. Fairmount was Philadelphia’s second attempt at creating a municipal water delivery system. It was operational until 1909, and included a nearby three million gallon reservoir contained in a monumental earthwork, which the Philadelphia Museum of Art now sits atop (looming in the top left background). All of the Neo Classical styling you see is purely facade.
After 1909, the site became the home of the Philadelphia Aquarium (until 1962), and later housed an indoor swimming pool (until 1973). These days, there’s an educational operation there called the “Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center,” and a fancy pants restaurant.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
What really drew my interests here, however, is the Fairmount Dam. A tidal River, much like the East River back home in NYC, the Schuylkill experiences a mix of brackish and fresh water. The Fairmount Dam, completed in 1822, raises the level of the fresh water flowing down to Philly all the way from distant Pottsville and rural Pennsylvania to the north. Above the dam it’s fresh water, below – brackish.
The spill way creates a basin, referred to as the “Schuylkill Pond” by the cheesesteak eaters, which seems to have drawn large numbers of collegiate rowers to its placidity over the centuries. That line of structures on the horizon in the shot above form up “Boathouse Row.” Its seems that local universities including Drexel, Penn, and La Salle have rowing teams based here, and the basin is the setting for multiple rowing regattas.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Simple engineering like this spillway dam is something which I bring up during superfund conversations about my beloved Newtown Creek all the time. Our problem on Newtown Creek is ultimately about “flow” and quickening the pace of water flowing through the channel. I like any solution to this problem which doesn’t require pumps or “adding” energy into the system via mechanical means. This dam functions purely on gravity, and also serves as a fish ladder for critters returning form the sea to lay clutches of eggs upriver.
This was the last entry on my shot list for the Schuylkill River, and it was long past time for a meal and a whole lot of liquid. I was hungry, and thirsty.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One clambered over the artificial hill that the Philadelphia Museum of Art squats upon. Yes, these are “those” steps. The ones from the Rocky movies. Dun dun dun, dun dun dun, dun dan dun de dun…
I’m told that the cheesesteak eaters get all livid if you refer to this area as the “Rocky Steps.” Once again, I will state plainly – I’m from Brooklyn and shit talking Philly is just ingrained in me. I also don’t get upset when cinematic references are made about my own – far superior – City.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
While watching tourists discover that running up these steps is actually quite the athletic endeavor, a humble narrator was busily scrolling through a Google map describing eateries and restaurants nearby.
Eastern State Penitentiary was just a few blocks away, and a long line of bars and restaurants which seemed to be open were described as being just across the street from the decommissioned prison.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The camera was converted over from landscape to handheld modality, the tripod tied up to my bag, and a general policing around my person accomplished. One set off to the presumptive northeast, in search of sustenance and refueling.
More tomorrow, at this – your Newtown Pentacle.
“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 