Archive for the ‘Photowalks’ Category
cylcopean mass
It’s National Applesauce Cake Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A humble narrator was out of the house early today, to attend a meeting sponsored by the Queens Chamber of Commerce which invited a team from the NYC EDC to present their feasibility study on the Sunnyside Yards at the Bulova Corporate Center found on the border of Astoria and East Elmhurst. I’m happy to say that this was a well attended meeting, and that the attendees included members of the Queens activist community as well as the usual and expected representatives from the Real Estate Industrial Complex. A breakfast meeting, bagels and coffee were offered, along with those very sweet little danishes which are typical of corporate catering.
The EDC presentation was offered by one of their many Vice Presidents, a charming fellow named Nate Bliss. I inquired after the meeting, and there was no relation to the Neziah Bliss family of Greenpoint, just as a note.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The EDC presentation was a roadshow version of the executive summary report found at their website. The presentation glossed over several seminal objections to the project which have been offered by various community organizations such as the gargantuan size of the deck itself (at 43rd street and Barnett Avenue in Sunnyside Gardens, for instance – 109-110 feet above street grade, or at Northern Blvd. and 39th/Steinway – 65-70 feet), but did acknowledge the transit and environmental issues associated with creating a new development that would require between 10 and 19 new schools to be built, and which would install a new population in LIC that would number about half that of Boulder, Colorado – on the 180 acres found between Queens Plaza and 43rd street, Northern Blvd. and Skillman Avenue.
I asked them what they’re planning on plugging the deck and city of towers built on it into, electrical wise. I threw some shade at the fact that their report says that’s it’s not feasible to bring construction materials to the job site, which is a rail yard, by rail. Pointedly asked them, as well, about how they intended to route the thousands of daily trucks which would be carrying in steel and concrete since they won’t be using the railroad to do it.
Ultimately, there’s two efficient routes, and both feed in through Manhattan from the continent – George Washington Bridge down 125th street to Triborough and then through Astoria, or Lincoln Tunnel across 42nd street to Queensboro. Guess which one they’ll pick?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
To be entirely clear, despite the fact that the Sunnyside Yards is literally “in my back yard,” my resistance to the plan has nothing to do with the dismissive term “NIMBY” thrown about by the Real Estate Industrial Complex and the bureaucrats of Lower Manhattan. Western Queens is suffocating for lack of infrastructure given the construction boom which has been underway for the last decade and a half. The MTA is overwhelmed, we’ve been closing power plants instead of building new ones, the sewer system is overburdened and outdated. Somebody in the meeting asked me “where are people going to live?” which is the sort of thing that a real estate developer always throws out as if they’re doing us some sort of favor or good deed with the condemnation of whole city blocks and the subsequent erection of mirror glass skinned towers.
Short answer is this – if we improve our transit system, people can live anywhere they want to. Before the ABC and 456 lines reached into northern Manhattan and the 123 lines went to the Bronx, those areas were typified by farmland. So was most of Queens and Eastern Brooklyn, prior to the arrival of the Subways a century ago. Transit expansion equals an opportunity for rapacious profiteering on the part of the real estate industrial complex, and since greed seems to be the only thing that motivates us these days… Imagine the possibilities of an elevated track that crossed from the 103rd Corona Avenue stop on the 7 south across the transit deserts of Queens and Brooklyn all the way to Broadway Junction.
The mind boggles.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
hewn roughly
It’s National Moonshine Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It actually isn’t your imagination, the quality of subway service has definitively declined in recent months. There has been a concurrent decline in LIRR service, and I understand the Metro North ridership isn’t too happy either. I did a bit of research, and discovered the likely reason why. It seems that Fernando Ferrer is now the acting chairman of the MTA. Yep, Mr. Ferrer, who was appointed to be the Borough President of the Bronx (back then he called himself “Freddy”) after his predecessor went to jail for corruption and personally presided over that Borough’s period of absolute cultural and societal apogee – from 1987-2001 – is temporarily in charge of things at MTA. Explains everything, huh?
I know. If you went to the Monster.com site or were reviewing LinkedIn job listings for “Chairman of the MTA,” it would be strange if the resume requirements didn’t ask for “identity politician, failed mayoral candidate, disastrous Borough President, or Loyal Political Party Apparatchnik who never held a real job before entering politics right out of college.” If you think Bill de Blasio is lousy, read up on Ferrer. De Blasio actually stole the whole “tale of two cities” line from Ferrer’s 2001 mayoral campaign, which indicates to you how few of the ideas the current Mayor offers are actually his own.
Perhaps, the resume requirements for MTA chairman (temporary, acting, or otherwise) should include – in addition to knowing how to use Excel and Outlook – some experience in running a commuter rail service and or a largish fleet of buses rather than being a loyal if ineffective and ideologically based machine politician. Just saying.
Ferrer, Mark Green… these guys are like some sort of recurring political infection which flares up occasionally.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’ve been walking past this access cover in Astoria for nearly ten years, and never noticed it before last week. It indicates that some of the oldest municipal “tackle” is found below, related to the water supply system. I wrote about a similar hatch cover encountered over in Williamsburg back in January of this year, but you generally don’t see hatches of this type in Queens. That’s because LIC (and Newtown) had their own water supply companies which were separate from the Croton system at the time of City consolidation in 1898, and is why you commonly observe access covers adorned with “LIC” in western Queens rather than ones with the Catskill tag.
Whatever pipe is found down there – and who can guess, all there is, that might be hidden down there – it’s controlled by the modern day DEP today, but it’s still a bit odd that I’ve never noticed this particular cover before.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Over in the City, at Governeurs Lane’s terminus nearby the ferry terminal at Pier 11, this food cart was spotted. Can’t tell you why, but it just grabbed my eye. That’s the FDR drive up above, which would normally lead me into a whole “thing” about this being the “house of Robert Moses” but after ranting about Freddy Ferrer, I’m a bit wobbly.
See y’all tonight at Green Drinks Queens, at the Riverview Restaurant in LIC, details are below. Come with?
Upcoming Tours and events
Green Drinks Queens LIC, June 5th, 6:00- 9:00 p.m.
Come celebrate UN World Environment Day with Green Drinks: Queens on the LIC Waterfront! This year’s theme is “Connecting People With Nature.” – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
indelibly inked
It’s National Rotisserie Chicken Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The new green roof at Broadway Stages’ 520 Kingsland Avenue building was recently made available to me for a couple of hours by the folks who installed and created the place – Alive Structures – in pursuance of creating a portfolio of photographs for brochure and website purposes. This is also a Newtown Creek Alliance project btw, and I packed up the “full kit,” including tripod and cable shutter release, in anticipation of getting both “artsy” and “fartsy.” It ain’t that often that I get to do the full set up for “proper” landscape style shots.
As always, I went well beyond my shot list, and figured that I’d show off a little bit in today’s post. That’s the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant in the shot above, with the camera looking through the invisible methane flames that the DEP is burning off towards lower Manhattan.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking across Newtown Creek towards Long Island City – you can see the Long Island Expressway truss bridge rising some 106 feet above its tributary, Dutch Kills, but it’s been completely overshadowed by the titan slabs of mirror glass rising along Jackson Avenue between Court Square and Queens Plaza.
The truss dates back to Robert Moses and 1939, btw, and its height was dictated by the needs of the maritime and industrial powers who used to rule the roost in LIC.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking eastwards, towards the two Koscisuzcko Bridges (1939 and 2017 models), and over the petroleum tanks of Metro Fuel. The Greenpoint Avenue Bridge is just on the other side of these tanks, but occluded by them in this shot. At the extreme left of the photo is the tree line of Calvary Cemetery in Queens’ Blissville section.
Nothing like getting high along Newtown Creek, I always say.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
For those of you who saw me looking particularly sun burnt in middle May, these shots are the reason why. I spent something like two and change hours up on the roof at 520 Kingsland Avenue, mainly waiting for the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself to dip behind the Shining City and make the shot above possible.
If you’d like to take a look at 520 Kinsgland for yourself, NCA and Riverkeeper will be conducting a “community visioning” project there tomorrow between one and four, and then between five and seven I’ll be offering a history lecture and green roof tour of the space… come with? It’s all free, and the RSVP details are in the links below.
Upcoming Tours and events
Newtown Creek Alliance and Riverkeeper Visioning, June 3rd, 1-4 p.m..
Imagine the future of Newtown Creek with Riverkeeper and NCA at the Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) – details here.
Newtown Creek Alliance History lecture with NCA historian Mitch Waxman, June 3rd, 5:00- 7:30 p.m.
An free hour long lecture and slideshow about Newtown Creek’s incredible history at the gorgeous Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) followed by a walk around the roof and a Q&A – details here.
Green Drinks Queens LIC, June 5th, 6:00- 9:00 p.m.
Come celebrate UN World Environment Day with Green Drinks: Queens on the LIC Waterfront! This year’s theme is “Connecting People With Nature.” – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
failing light
It’s National Hazelnut Cake day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the tug Sea Lion in the shot above, hurtling across the Kill Van Kull with an industrial section of Bayonne, New Jersey and the skyline of Lower Manhattan providing a backdrop. One hasn’t been focusing in on the harbor all that much in recent months for one reason or another, but it’s nothing personal, rather it’s an “art” thing. There’s only so many ways to frame and shoot a passing vessel, when you really get down to it. I’ll figure out some way to make it interesting again, as I was trying to do in the shot above by shooting “wide open” and going for depth of field rather than my normal “tack sharp” narrow aperture method for maritime shots.
Sea Lion is looking pretty good, given that she sunk a few years ago off the coast of Long Island – check out NY Media Boat’s page describing that disaster.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Passing out of the Kill Van Kull, and into the Upper Bay, three McAllister tugs were observed “wrassling” a cargo ship into position for it to exit NY waters. There’s two tugs pictured above, the Eric and Bruce A. McAllister’s, and the third one was on the other side of the cargo ship.
I was onboard a NY Waterways boat hired by the Working Harbor Committee for a tour of Newark Bay, in my capacity as the group’s official photographer. These WHC trips have become quite a melancholy experience for me in the last few years, as I spend most of my time onboard reminiscing about a few buddies whom I always enjoyed hanging out or working with on these excursions that have left this mortal coil – Bernie Ente, Capt. John Doswell, and most recently John Skelson.
Absent friends… lift glasses… clink.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I didn’t observe the usual post op ritual which the WHC crew enacts this time around, heading over to a hole in the wall bar on Pearl Street for a pint to compare notes about the trip. Queens was calling, and given the intensity of my schedule during the month of May, I was of no mind to delay getting home to our Lady of the Pentacle and Zuzu the dog.
The 5 line carried me from Lower Manhattan to the 59th and Lex hub, where an R line transfer was enacted, which carried me home to the rolling hills of almond eyed Astoria.
Upcoming Tours and events
Newtown Creek Alliance and Riverkeeper Visioning, June 3rd, 1-4 p.m..
Imagine the future of Newtown Creek with Riverkeeper and NCA at the Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) – details here.
Newtown Creek Alliance History lecture with NCA historian Mitch Waxman, June 3rd, 5:00- 7:30 p.m.
An free hour long lecture and slideshow about Newtown Creek’s incredible history at the gorgeous Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) followed by a walk around the roof and a Q&A – details here.
Green Drinks Queens LIC, June 5th, 6:00- 9:00 p.m.
Come celebrate UN World Environment Day with Green Drinks: Queens on the LIC Waterfront! This year’s theme is “Connecting People With Nature.” – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
angry pustule
It’s National Macaroon Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Everybody hates a tourist, they say. Me? I love ’em, especially when I’m the guide and the tour has come to my beloved Newtown Creek. 3.8 miles long, Newtown Creek is a tributary of NYC’s East River which defines around 3 miles of the currently undefended border of the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens. Newtown Creek has multiple tributaries of its own – Dutch Kills, Unnamed Canal, Whale Creek, Maspeth Creek, the East Branch, and English Kills. It’s largely surrounded by an industrial zone which was once home to petroleum refineries and manufactured gas plants, which has left behind an unwholesome environmental legacy in the ground and water which earned the Newtown Creek a place on the Environmental Protection Agency’s “Superfund” list.
There are multiple bridges crossing the Newtown Creek. Starting from the west – you’ve got the Pulaski Bridge; at Dutch Kills you’ve got the DB Cabin and Cabin M rail bridges as well as the Borden Avenue Bridge, LIE truss bridge, and Hunters Point Avenue Bridge. Back on the main waterway, there’s the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge. At the East Branch there’s the Grand Street Bridge, and at English Kills there’s the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge and the Montrose Avenue rail bridge. Pictured above are the 1939 and 2017 model Koscisuzcko bridges.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Early 21st century industry on the Newtown Creek is typified by the waste handling trade, and whether it’s the recycling yards or the “putrescent waste” handlers, there are dozens of waste transfer stations found along the bulkheads. There are still petroleum and gas businesses found along the water, but the name of the game these days is distribution rather than manufacture. Newtown Creek is one of the favored release points for NYC’s combined sewer system, and about 1.4 billion gallons of untreated sewage finds its way here annually. The TV and film industry, or “Hollywood,” has recently been acquiring huge parcels along the waterfront. At the mouth of the Newtown Creek, near its intersection with the East River, enormous housing and real estate projects are underway which will bring a large residential population to its shores.
The hard bottom of Newtown Creek is about 25-40 feet below the surface, depending on where you are. The “soft bottom” of Newtown Creek is roughly 15-20 feet down – a bed of toxic sediment composed of industrial waste (petroleum and byproducts, coal tar, raw sewage – everything that has ever fallen or been released into the water) which is referred to as “Black Mayonnaise.” The removal of this black mayonnaise and the restoration of normal environmental conditions in the water is the stated mission of the Federal Environmental Protection Agency’s Superfund team.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Endemic environmental pollution exists in the upland properties surrounding the Newtown Creek. The “Greenpoint Oil Spill” is the second largest oil spill in American history, after the Deepwater Horizon Spill in the Gulf of Mexico. There’s other pockets of oil on the Queens side in Blissville. On both the Brooklyn and Queens sides, plumes of chemicals and solvents move about in subterranean mud with the tides. Thousands of heavy trucks ply the streets surrounding the Newtown Creek daily. The unending miles of concrete, and nearly complete lack of vegetation, causes the summer temperatures to rise between ten and fifteen degrees higher in the industrial zones than in the surrounding neighborhoods in accordance with the “Maspeth Heat Island Effect.” The air is filled with particulate materials delivered by automotive exhaust from the Brooklyn Queens Expressway, Long Island Expressway, and Queens Midtown Tunnel.
Welcome to the Newtown Creek.
Upcoming Tours and events
Newtown Creek Alliance and Riverkeeper Visioning, June 3rd, 1-4 p.m..
Imagine the future of Newtown Creek with Riverkeeper and NCA at the Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) – details here.
Newtown Creek Alliance History lecture with NCA historian Mitch Waxman, June 3rd, 5:00- 7:30 p.m.
An free hour long lecture and slideshow about Newtown Creek’s incredible history at the gorgeous Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) followed by a walk around the roof and a Q&A – details here.
Green Drinks Queens LIC, June 5th, 6:00- 9:00 p.m.
Come celebrate UN World Environment Day with Green Drinks: Queens on the LIC Waterfront! This year’s theme is “Connecting People With Nature.” – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 