contracted chill
Nothing like an adventure, MTA style.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Recent endeavor found me leaving HQ just after the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself had begun its journey across the sky. A humble narrator’s intention was to have been out and about for a couple of hours in the pre dawn part of the day, but one overslept and left the house just as dawn arrived. My eventual destination was in lower Manhattan, and my plan was to be mid span on the Queensboro Bridge when dawn occurred, but as mentioned – I rolled over and kept on sleeping rather than springing out of bed when the alarm sounded at four in the morning. It wasn’t until about 5:30 that I stumbled out into the staggering realities of Astoria.
A brief scuttle across Northern Blvd. and the Sunnyside Yards ensued, and bored with the idea of walking across Queensboro at this point, it was elected that I would catch the most photogenic of all NYC’s Subway lines – the 7 – at 33rd street and cruise into the shadowed corridors of midtown Manhattan.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The “international express” as it’s known, arrived in the station accompanied by announcements that due to construction there was no Manhattan bound service at 33rd street. Having set aside literally five hours for the walk, I figured I’d just play along and see where the MTA wanted to take me.
As a note, with the exception of the F line, on the weekend of the 5th and 6th of March – there was “no way to get there from here” without playing the game laid out by the MTA.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The 7 carried me to the 61st Woodside stop, where Manhattan bound service could be accessed. Off in the distance, at what must have been the 69th street station, there were crews of laborers and what seemed like a crane busily at work. The normal “Manhattan bound” side was entirely subsumed by their activity.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The 7 train, with its multitudinous delays and seemingly constant construction, has spawned a bit of activism. My pal Melissa Orlando, and others, formed first a Facebook group called “The 7 Train Blues,” and have since begun the formation of an organization called “Access Queens” with the intention of acting as advocates for the ridership community along this “international express” traveling between Flushing and Manhattan’s west side.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On the subject of the 7 train, my immediate response is to discuss its immense photogeneity.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It is virtually impossible to point a camera at the 7 and not get something interesting. Maybe it’s the low lying nature of Western Queens, with the elevated tracks running at rooftop level… can’t say. After running through the MTA’s perverse hoops, a humble narrator found himself in the Shining City, and what was encountered at my destination will be discussed in a post presented next week at this – your Newtown Pentacle.
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mendicant parlors
Happy Saint Patrick’s, y’all.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The pup pictured above was spotted at the annual St. Pat’s Day for All parade in Sunnyside on Saturday the 6th. Truth be told, 50% of the reason I attend and shoot this parade is for the dogs dressed up in holiday regalia.
What follows is a series of random shots which have been recently collected, which don’t seem to fit into other posts, but which I like for one reason or another.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of the pithy jokes I like to repeat to disinterested people is: “When I say I’m a street photographer, I mean that I literally photograph the street,” as evinced by the shot of Northern Blvd. presented above.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Speaking of Northern Blvd., that ongoing constriction project at 47th street, which is installing a new ventilation room for the F line subway, had some supplies arranged in an accidentally artful pattern when I was passing by a couple of weeks back. The construction guys here in Queens compose masterpieces of geometric composition when they’re plunking their junk down, the sort of thing which any art student might labor over for days.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Early one recent morning, a humble narrator noticed that the Queens Cobbler seems to have reactivated and resumed their activities. The single shoe phenomena continues.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Also from an early morning, I found myself crossing the Boulevard of Death as the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself rose in the eastern sky.
This was shot at about six or seven in the morning, and this year my plans include a lot of pre dawn and early morning shooting.
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chelating agent
Astoria Queens is totally metal.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
At the corner of 29th street and 31st avenue is the definitive expression of my ennui when folks argue with me about whether or not “Long Island City” includes Astoria. Most people you speak to, including – disturbingly – people from the NYC EDC, don’t recognize the various sections of Western Queens by their proper names unless you include the abbreviation of “LIC.” A lot of native Astorians will swear up and down that when you say “LIC” it doesn’t include Astoria. Long Island City, as a point of fact, included everything between the East River and Blissville, and everything between Newtown Creek and Bowery Bay. There’s a few exemptions, with borders that followed Woodside Avenue and so on, but it was – and is – bigger than you think.
Inaccuracy and historical ignorance plague discussion of Western Queens. It makes me point my face downwards, and stare at the concrete as I scuttle about.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s actually a lot you can notice while staring at the ground, in search of some sort of solace. Most of it will be broken glass, hereabouts. The neighbors like to smash things that are smashable for some reason.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
At the corner of Steinway and 31st, I noticed this display in front of a juice bar. Despite my somewhat epic hatred of people who patronize juice bars (Juiceries? Juiceromats?), this accumulated mat of alfalfa grass rectangles is actually kind of a great idea.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This is the sort of illegal dumping that I can get behind. Now sod off.
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uncertain factors
Wash out, man, wash out.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
You’ll recall that at the end of February, there was a Götterdämmerung of a rain storm, one which produced quite a bit of coastal flooding. I got a phone call the day after the storm that declared that the shoreline at Astoria Park had fallen victim to the event. This would be some storm, thought I, which could bring a wave of water up the 15-20 feet from Glass Beach at Hells Gate all the way up to Shore Road.
I had to go take a look.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
From where Newtown Pentacle HQ is located, on Astoria’s Broaday in the 40’s, it’s only a small “schlep” to get to Astoria Park. In a car, it’ll take you around ten minutes, but only because of lights and traffic. It’s a 30 minute walk, or 45 if you lazily saunter.
Along the diagonal path, there’s a lot to see, and since Astoria rules… why not?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As mentioned above, Shore Road is elevated some 15-20 feet over the East River shoreline at Hells Gate. The rocky beach down there is littered with jetsam, it would be flotsam if it was still suspended in the water column, and the smaller particles of jetsam are mixed in with the gravel and small stones with little bits of river polished glass – hence “Glass Beach.”
Regardless, one reiterates – that would have to be one HELL of a storm to bring the water all the way up to Shore Road from Hells Gate.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Observations were enacted, and there were two wash outs which had deposited a terrific amount of quite slippery mud onto both sidewalk and street. The trail of soil and vegetation led back uphill to Astoria Park itself, which actually jibed with what I thought to have been the case. It was the park that flooded during the heavy rains, and the river had not in fact risen. If the East River rose 20 feet, waves would be lapping away at Steinway Street’s intersection with Northern Blvd. and we’d be talking about the Sunnyside Yards lake.
Mayor de Blasio would, of course, call it the Sunnyside Yards lake and resort and announce his intentions to install waterfront affordable housing along Skillman Avenue.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Fairly obviously, the two mud and water flows emanated from the two Bridges over Astoria Park, which gathered the storm water and then fed it down their outfall pipes into and onto the soil in Astoria Park, which caused the “lahar” or slippery mud deposits which were observed on Shore Road.
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unknown respondent
Sludge Boats, baby, Sludge Boats.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
These shots are actually from the height of that shoulder injury period last month, and represent a desperate desire one acted upon to “shake it off” by indulging in a bit of exercise. The weather was less than cooperative from a light point of view, and the affected limb was less than pleased at the rest of my body moving around, so I decided that since I was in the “hell of pain” I’d simply head over to Hells Gate and indulge the horror.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Luckily for my diversion starved and somewhat depressed state of mind, the MV Red Hook was observed while debarking from the Wards Island dewatering facility across the river. Wards Island is the end point for the sewage sludge process, which is operated by the NYC DEP. Centrifugal machines are fed the material, which has the consistency of syrup or warm honey at the end of the thickening process at the various neighborhood sewer plants, which is carried here by the DEP’s fleet of “Honey” or Sludge boats. The dewatered material is compressed into “cakes” and sold for use as fertilizer on non food crops such as cotton and Christmas Trees.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
MV Red Hook is one of NYC’s older generation of Sludge Boats, although it’s the newest of its type – having come online in 2012. The newer class of Sludge Boats has been discussed here at Newtown Pentacle before.
from NYC.gov
The Red Hook sludge vessel was built over a three-year period in Brownsville, Texas by Keppel AmFELS. Once completed, it took seven days to make its way to New York City, arriving on November 19, 2008. The vessel has recently completed post-delivery dry-dock inspections and adjustments at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and is ready for service. Each six-person crew consists of a captain, chief engineer, assistant engineer, mate and two mariners. Crews work a 40-hour week divided into 14, 13, and 13 hour shifts. The Red Hook is slightly over 350 feet long, about 53 feet wide, with a depth of slightly over 21 feet. It has eight storage tanks with 150,000 cubic foot capacity equivalent to 1.2 million gallons. The Red Hook weighs over 2,098 long tons and is designed to travel at 12.75 knots or approximately 15 miles per hour. On a typical week, each vessel makes 14 round trips and visits eight wastewater treatment plants.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
All of the DEP’s honey boats will find themselves heading to or from Wards Island periodically, after making their rounds at one of the City’s 14 sewer plants. Hells Gate is a great place to spot them, and Shore Road along Astoria Park is a great place to observe Hells Gate.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There are many who would agree with me, in my assertion that the view from Shore Road rocks.
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