Posts Tagged ‘Astoria’
mental complexity
It’s National Chocolate Milkshake Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My daily walk for the last few weeks, due to certain constraints on schedule and other obligations, has been decidedly local in nature and a humble narrator has seldom found himself less than an hour from HQ before its time to turn around and head back. As I enjoy the distinct pleasure of living on the southern side of Astoria, Queens – this isn’t that big a burden. Lurking, in fear – after all – around Western Queens is one of my favorite activities.
There’s always something interesting happening here in the ancient village.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Over on Steinway Street’s intersection with 34th avenue, there’s a mid sized construction job going on. A former one story furniture store is being converted over to a multi story residential dealie. The iron workers have been busy at this corner all summer, doing their thing, and a whole crew of local lords and ladies have been observed entering and leaving the job site in their bright yellow vests since last winter.
I know that to some calloused eyes this is “gentrification” occurring, but it’s hard to argue against creating both a bunch of construction jobs and some new housing units that are so close to the 34th avenue side of the Steinway Street stop on the R and M lines. Y’know, no form of housing is “affordable” unless you’ve got an opportunity for gainful employment and the chance to earn a living from it. That is, unless your idea of “affordable” involves the redistribution of earned wealth from someone else’s pocket into yours.
Just saying.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On this particular day, a crane was delivering steel beams and the union guys were crawling all over the skeleton of the new building. I can tell that they’re Union, as you’ll notice all of the safety equipment they’ve got on display. If this was a non Union job, these cats would be sporting baseball hats instead of hard hats, and the safety harnesses they’re wearing would be absent or made of duct tape.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
They seemed to know their business, these fellows (I think they’re fellows at least, as I wasn’t close enough to discern sex), and after snapping out a few shots I moved on. My half way point destination for the afternoon walk was set to be Queens Blvd. in Sunnyside, where an easterly turn would be undertaken towards Roosevelt Avenue and a return back to Astoria’s Broadway in the 40’s would be accomplished via Woodside Avenue.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Walking south down Steinway Street, where it transmogrifies into 39th street at Northern Blvd., one encountered this little assemblage of compound signage. It somehow fit my mood, and current worldview.
You people scare the hell out of me.
Upcoming Tours and events
The Insalubrious Valley of the Newtown Creek Walking Tour,
with Atlas Obscura – Saturday, September 23rd, 11 a.m. – 1:30 p.m.
Join us on the wrong side of the tracks for an exploration of the hidden industrial heartlands of Brooklyn and Queens, with Newtown Creek Alliance Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
true conditions
It’s National Salami Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On this day, in 70 AD, the Romans sacked Jerusalem. In 1776, the very first submarine attack on a warship occurred in New York Harbor when the Turtle attached a time bomb to the hull of HMS Eagle. In 1860, Garibaldi entered Naples and began the process of creating the modern day Nation of Italy. In 1921, the first Miss America pageant was held in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Over in San Francisco back in 1927, inventor Philo Farnsworth demonstrated the first television signal. Benjamin, the last of the thylacines, died alone in a Tasmanian zoo in 1936. In 1940, the Nazis began the London Blitz, and in 1978 Rock and Roll drummer Keith Moon kicked the bucket.
The cool car pictured above was spotted in Greenpoint, incidentally. I was out one night conducting a walking tour of Newtown Creek and happened across it. The graffiti is what drew me in.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After conducting the walking tour, one set upon his path back towards the rolling hills of almond eyed Astoria, but had to pass through the concrete devastations of Hunters Point and Queens Plaza in order to do so. It was a nice night, and I decided upon walking home. On my way, I passed by the Queens Midtown Tunnel and captured this shot.
The funny bit – to me at least – about the current efforts by the State of New York to elimate toll booths in favor of electronic tolling is that no one thought about what happens on the Manhattan side of the tunnel. I’ve been noticing massive traffic backups on the Long Island Expressway since they instituted the new system, which was meant to ease traffic and smooth the commute for the 80,000 or so daily vehicle trips through the tunnel. The toll booths had the effect of causing traffic to pulse through the toll plaza four or five at a time, but now the traffic just snakes into it. The head of the snake emerges into the City and is met by traffic lights on second avenue. Those traffic lights are now the de facto governors of how fast traffic can flow through the tunnel, and on the 71 miles of the Long Island Expressway found to the east of it.
The military guys and gals have a word for this sort of thing – it’s “FUBAR.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Back in Astoria, it was preternaturally dark when I arrived home, but this sort of thing doesn’t bother my little dog Zuzu. She operates by smell and sound, my dog, and as we engaged in her evening saunter and as she performed her investigative sniffing, I was growing increasingly apprehensive for some reason.
My pineal gland was twitching with latent horror.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As we swung back around onto Broadway and made our way back towards HQ, a large group of teenaged men were riding their bicycles down the block in a pack. According to a report I saw on the local CBS TV news, events such as this are to be viewed in a menacing light and feared. I found it menacing simply because they’re all teenagers. Darned kids, with their bicycles and the hip hop, engaging in group activities without first obtaining police permits or parental approval. Chaos!
There should be a curfew for anyone under the age of thirty, I tell ya. Damn kids.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Bicycles such as the ones pictured above are a fairly modern invention, but some scholars attribute the first bike design to a sketch by one of DaVinci’s students in 1534. The first verified appearance of bicycles was in the 19th century, specifically in 1817 Germany with the “dandy horse.” These were “running machines” which were operated sans pedals or chains. The velocipede era saw the addition of pedals to the front wheel, but it wasn’t until 1863 that a french engineer came up with what we’d recognize instantly as a bike – with pedals and a chain driven rotary crank. What you’re looking at in the shot above are 21st century variants of what was introduced as the “safety bicycle” back in 1885. John Dunlop introduced the pneumatic tire in 1888. In 1889, the diamond shaped frame of the modern bike was introduced, in a model that also folded. The modern multi geared bike, which included a “Derailleur” mechanism on the chain, came on the scene at the start of the 20th century. Everything since has simply been refinement of the design.
Teenagers, however, have always been dangerous and unpredictable. Curfew!
Upcoming Tours and events
Calvary Cemetery Walking Tour, with Atlas Obscura – Saturday, September 9th, 11 a.m. – 1 p.m.
Explore NYC history, hidden inside sculptural monuments and mafioso grave sites, as you take in iconic city views on this walking tour, with Newtown Creek Alliance Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
three divisions
It’s National Spumoni Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Gaze ye wicked, and despair, for today’s solar eclipse heralds a new dark age! when the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself is occluded by the heathen Moon… well… let’s just say things are going to be getting pretty metal this afternoon. My understanding is that you’ll start seeing it go dark around 1:20 p.m., with the eclipse peaking at precisely 2:44 p.m. and the whole thing is meant to be over and done with by 4 p.m. That’s a two hour and forty minute window during which the dead might rise, Satan’s abominable court will hold authority upon the Earth, and an interval during which cats and dogs will live together peaceably will occur.
The lords and ladies pictured above have warned us, and they did it on Steinway Street no less. That’s democratizing the “word,” I tell ya. Repent, for the time of tribulation is nigh! Nigh I tell you, nigh.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A few people asked me where I’d be photographing the eclipse from, and they shuddered at my answer that I’ll be hunkered down and deep underground in the bunker we set up for the Mayan Apocalypse a few years ago.
So many unlikely things have occurred this year… the odds of there being a triffid swarm clacking down the LIE in search of prey blinded by staring into the sun, or the dead rising at Calvary… the mind boggles at the possibilities. My biggest worry actually revolves around the holy rollers, whose emergent flat earth proselytizing and general supranormal belief system might be threatened by the celestial display, losing their collective minds and starting a riot.
I don’t need no eclipse glasses, yo. I’ve got my tin foil hat to protect my delicate eyes.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I do live in a neighborhood which has a “hells gate” after all, here in Astoria, Queens. That’s why I’ll be in the bunker.
Tribulation!
Upcoming Tours and events
DUPBO Newtown Creek Walking Tour, with NYCH20 – Thursday August 24th, 7 p.m. – 9 p.m.
Explore Greenpoint and Hunters Point, with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
America’s Workshop Newtown Creek Walking Tour, with Atlas Obscura – Saturday August 26th, 11 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Explore the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek in Long Island City, with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
embroidered legend
It’s National Lemon Meringue Pie Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Once upon a time, the scene pictured above would have included the premises of one of Brooklyn’s largest employers, the American Manufacturing Company, but that would have been during the very late 19th and early 20th century. At the close of the 20th century, you’d have been looking at twenty two acres of abandoned and derelict factories and warehouse buildings which folks referred to as “Forgotten City” or simply the “Greenpoint Terminal Market.”
If you were here in 2006, you’d be looking at the largest fire FDNY had to deal with since the World Trade Center collapse on September 11th.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the Ditmars terminal stop for the N and W lines of the NYCTA subway system, overflown by a concretized arch which carries the NY Connecting Railroad tracks towards the Hell Gate Bridge in the Astoria section of Long Island City. Pictured is a “work train,” as the MTA is currently busy on the elevated tracks applying some of their endless series of band aids to the centuried elevated, which opened for business on July 19 in 1917.
It’s a semantic point, incidentally, but Astoria is indeed part of Long Island City. If your zip code starts with a “111” you live in the former independent municipality of Long Island City.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s a pair of courting pigeons pictured above, high over 31st street at the Broadway stop of the N line. “Columba livia domestica” is how you’d describe these critters to the scientifically minded, but the cool kids kids just call them Pigeons. Those two above are involved in a courtship ritual, which I interrupted by taking a photo of them. Pigeons reportedly mate for life, although the fellows are known to stray when they have the opportunity.
I’m happy to have provided these two lovebirds with a shot of their first date, for posterity and to show their grandkids.
Upcoming Tours and events
Two Newtown Creek Boat Tours, with Newtown Creek Alliance and Open House NY – Wednesday August 16th, 5 p.m. and 7 p.m.
The neighborhoods surrounding Newtown Creek are home to the densest collection of these garbage facilities anywhere in the city and collectively, the waste transfer stations around and along Newtown Creek handle almost 40% of the waste that moves through New York. Join Newtown Creek Alliance’s Mitch Waxman and Willis Elkins to learn about the ongoing efforts to address the environmental burden that this “clustering” has caused. – details here.
DUPBO Newtown Creek Walking Tour, with NYCH20 – Thursday August 24th, 7 p.m. – 9 p.m.
Explore Greenpoint and Hunters Point, with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
America’s Workshop Newtown Creek Walking Tour, with Atlas Obscura – Saturday August 26th, 11 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Explore the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek in Long Island City, with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
latent idiosyncrasies
It’s National Creamsicle Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Whilst watching a bird eating some random drunk’s vomit here in Astoria recently, a humble narrator found himself contemplating the news of the day. One soon realized that he’d rather watch a bird feeding on puke than deep dive into another pointless conversation about the news of the day. Nazis…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One is disgusted, depressed, and despondent.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I just do not have anything to say. I just can’t.
Upcoming Tours and events
Two Newtown Creek Boat Tours, with Newtown Creek Alliance and Open House NY – Wednesday August 16th, 5 p.m. and 7 p.m.
The neighborhoods surrounding Newtown Creek are home to the densest collection of these garbage facilities anywhere in the city and collectively, the waste transfer stations around and along Newtown Creek handle almost 40% of the waste that moves through New York. Join Newtown Creek Alliance’s Mitch Waxman and Willis Elkins to learn about the ongoing efforts to address the environmental burden that this “clustering” has caused. – details here.
DUPBO Newtown Creek Walking Tour, with NYCH20 – Thursday August 24th, 7 p.m. – 9 p.m.
Explore Greenpoint and Hunters Point, with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 