Posts Tagged ‘DUGABO’
moon men
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One found his boots scraping along the concrete of Railroad Avenue, back in February. A long walk was underway, and the camera’s shutter was a-whirring.
Railroad Avenue was where my pathway led.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
More evidence of the Queens Cobbler was observed. A probable serial killer who leaves behind single shoes to mark their efforts, I’ve been writing about the Cobbler for years. The Cobbler has even left personal messages for me in front of my own domicile.
Chilling, no?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Just up the block from the Cobbler’s latest memento mori, yet another abandoned car was encountered. This one was electric, and tiny. Rumor has it that there’s a community of Homo Floresiensis who have recently moved into and taken up residence in Middle Village. Perhaps this was theirs? May I refer to Middle Village as the Shire now?
Really, the world I live in is so much more interesting than the real one.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I walked up a somewhat private road, past the former Van Iderstine rendering plant, and back out onto Review Avenue.
One wasn’t quite done with Dutch Kills, and since the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself was exiting the sky’s vault – that was what I was waiting for to complete my task.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The shots in today’s post date back to the 12th of February, incidentally. As mentioned in prior posts, the usual three image posts will be cast aside for a bit, in favor of six shot ones until I manage to get back into sync with the actual calendar.
Also, just in case you don’t scroll all the way down to the bottom – The Newtown Creekathon is happening on April 10th.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Having looped back to Review Avenue, a humble narrator pointed his toes back in the direction that he started from – Dutch Kills.
Trucks, trucks, trucks. For some reason, I’m fascinated with trucks at the moment. Don’t know why, they just catch my eye.
The Newtown Creekathon returns!
On April 10th, the all day death march around Newtown Creek awakens from its pandemic slumber.
DOOM! DOOM! Fully narrated by Mitch Waxman and Will Elkins of Newtown Creek Alliance, this one starts in LIC at the East River, heads through Blissville, the happy place of Industrial Maspeth, dips a toe in Ridgewood and then plunges desperately into Brooklyn. East Williamsburgh and then Greenpoint are visited and a desperate trek to the East River in Brooklyn commences. DOOM! Click here for more information and to reserve a spot – but seriously – what’s wrong with you that you’re actually considering doing this? DOOM!
“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.
<!– /wp:paragraphparabolic contradiction
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Scuttling, always scuttling, from place to place with camera in hand. Filthy black raincoat flapping about in the poison wind. Sometimes, the light is absolutely glorious.
We pick up where last week left off, at the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek in Long Island City. One had set up the camera into its long exposure/landscape modality, with filter and tripod and the rest of the deal. Sunset was just getting underway.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
When leaving HQ, it had already been decided that this was going to be a long walk, and that a lot of ground would be covered. That’s the LIRR’S Cabin M railroad bridge, which was described in some detail in last Friday’s post.
Before you ask, this was a Sunday, and there’s virtually zero chance of getting in the way of freight rail operations along Newtown Creek on a Sunday.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s a not exactly secret pathway along the water down here, between the two rail bridges on Dutch Kills. I seldom walk it, as it’s pretty obscure and were I to find myself in trouble down here I’d have a hard time explaining to the 911 operator where I was.
Saying that, I do roll through here occasionally.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s DB Cabin, another LIRR rail bridge, but one whose tracks are normally pretty active. It connects two freight rail yards across the waters of Dutch Kills, and carries the LIRR’s Lower Montauk tracks.
Kills is “old Dutch” for Creek, I’m told.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A new player has emerged in the Blissville yard, which is a good thing. Not sure what they do, but it’s good to see freight rail being embraced by industry.
One continued scuttling along in an easterly direction, towards the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Pictured is DUGABO – Down under the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge Onramp. The surface street is called “Railroad Avenue.”
On my Amtrak travels last fall, I discovered that there’s a street called “Railroad Avenue” in nearly every City that I went looking for one in.
More tomorrow.
The Newtown Creekathon returns!
On April 10th, the all day death march around Newtown Creek awakens from its pandemic slumber.
DOOM! DOOM! Fully narrated by Mitch Waxman and Will Elkins of Newtown Creek Alliance, this one starts in LIC at the East River, heads through Blissville, the happy place of Industrial Maspeth, dips a toe in Ridgewood and then plunges desperately into Brooklyn. East Williamsburgh and then Greenpoint are visited and a desperate trek to the East River in Brooklyn commences. DOOM! Click here for more information and to reserve a spot – but seriously – what’s wrong with you that you’re actually considering doing this? DOOM!
“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.
<!– /wp:paragraphpsychopathic institution
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
So, a few weeks back, a barge sunk into the gelatinous waters of the gregarious Newtown Creek. This isn’t the first time, won’t be the last, this sort of thing happens. Nothing nasty got released into the water, the barge was filled with rock and sand. Saying all that, it’s quite the pickle raising a barge sitting under 20-30 feet of water, and it requires specialized gear and a crew of experts. Luckily, NY Harbor being NY Harbor, there are a couple of outfits which will rent you the equipment and help you hire the experts needed to operate their stuff.
That’s capitalism for ya, huh? There’s a solution to every problem, if the price is right. Given the times we live in – that’s not a critique of our grandiose economic system, rather it’s an appreciative comment on a part of its feature set.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Lucky for a humble narrator, this particular barge went down in a spot nearby a location which I’ve got access to over in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn. After attending a Newtown Creek Alliance press event in Maspeth earlier in the day, which involved a couple of Congress members and a gaggle of local “electeds,” I hitched a ride back to Greenpoint and got busy.
It was the worst time of day for light during the winter – right around noon o’clock – but I was prepared for that, and the tripod was deployed with an ND Filter affixed to the lens to slow things down and control the amount of light a bit. I got “a-clicking.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It seems that there was a diver in the water, who was attaching ropes and airbags and all sorts of arcane hoses to the sunken barge. That hit of motion blur on the crane’s arm betrays the process – with the diver and laborers moving ropes and chains around and under the sunken barge. Every now and then, you’d see the diver’s helmet pop up out of the drink.
How exciting.
“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.
amorphous amenity
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Lucky. Just happened to be in the right place at the right time, which happened to be the Brooklyn/Queens border, found on the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge, at about 8 o’clock at night on a Friday in middle January. The tug is the CMT Pike, a 1979 vintage push boat operated by Coeymans Marine Towing.
This was a very, very difficult shot to get the exposure right for, as a note. The difficulty was due to the contrasting environment of bright lights and deep shadow, and complicated by the boat being operated at full steam and sliding quickly across the gelatinous waters of Newtown Creek.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One doesn’t like heading home along the same path which he left it from, so my toes were pointed in a generally “Maspethian” direction for the return leg of things. There’s a little park, on Review Avenue at the corner of Laurel Hill Blvd., that was constructed along with the new Koscisuzcko Bridge. One likes to have a bit of sit down there when out for a long walk, and although sitting on a block of concrete in January isn’t exactly comfortable, it’s still nice to be able to take a load off for a few minutes and “unclick” my back.
As long as I was there, why not get in a couple of shots of the bridge? Why be lazy when you’re already out and about, and sitting down on a block of frozen concrete which is draining your body heat away through your butt?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My path back to HQ in Astoria found me walking through Sunnyside Gardens, and looking over my shoulder a lot. My paranoia alleviates around Newtown Creek, given how relatively depopulated it is. Sunnyside, however, enjoys quite a dense population. Using my old rubric that 2 out of every 10 people are straight up evil, what that means is that when you’re moving through a densely populated neighborhood about 20% of that population might screw with you.
My “rule” is that out of every ten people, two are evil and two are good. The remaining six are in the middle, and can go either way depending on whether or not they follow their social cues from the good two or the evil two. “The company you keep” isn’t just something your grandmother warned you about, in my mind.
“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.
cliffside cabin
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Intriguing are the bits of property which my Dad always referred to as “community driveways,” like the one in Astoria pictured above. The particular one above is interesting to me as it’s a dirt road. You don’t encounter much in the way of open soil here in Western Queens. A community driveway, for the uninitiated, is a pathway which leads to a “behind your house” parking spot and often a garage at the basement level. It’s an amenity!
Even the laconic Croats, and the other similarly reserved “Yugoslav” populations they coexist with here on Astoria’s southern edge, will get misty eyed when the subject of a private parking spot comes up.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Wandering around in the cold night, a humble narrator found that the aphorism “All roads lead to Calvary” was quite true when he found himself standing at the gate. It’s been quite a while since my last visit to the great polyandrion of the Roman Catholics, but since this one was well after sunset – the gates were securely fastened, as is the habit of the cemetery management. Couldn’t resist cracking out an exposure through the gate, however.
When leaving HQ, one told Our Lady of the Pentacle that I’d be taking a long walk, but that I didn’t plan on leaving Queens.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Not wanting to make a liar of myself, one walked onto the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge over Newtown Creek but didn’t cross the legal border into Brooklyn. Instead, I lingered mid span for an interval, and got lucky with what Queens wanted to show me. As a note, I sort of love the photo above, depicting a fuel truck traveling across the double bascule drawbridge.
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.
The Newtown Pentacle 