Posts Tagged ‘Long Island City’
beckoning beyonds
Confused paranoia and insensate musing, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My feet hurt, as does a knee or two.
Worries abound, all sorts of existential threats present themselves daily. The neighbors are worrisome and curious, and many of them were born to foreign communists. Some hail from terribly artificial nation states whose judicial system is built around medieval religious law, like Italy. There are public defecators and licentious drunks without, a riot of noise erupts constantly, and my dog has been curiously alert and watching the western sky of late. This Russia/Ukraine thing is also noisome, but we need the Russians, just in case Earth is ever invaded by an alien army.
For the same reason, we must preserve the felid specie of Tigers – for service as shock troops on the front lines of a true world war.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Surely, the universe has never been more unsettling than at the present moment, one can sense that the gears of fate and the clockwork of dharma spin inexorably toward doom, with a state of jellyfish like psychic dissolution awaiting the human infestation. Fearfully, willingly, entering into a dark age of ignorance and intolerant barbarism simply in the name of forgetting the horrible truths of our time.
How one longs for the good old days of centuries past. Things are so much worse now than they were a mere hundred years ago, during the opening shots of the “World War,” don’t you think?
Note: One prefers referring to WW1 to as “Phase One of the second Thirty Years War.” The First World War was merely a consolidation and clearing away of the medieval system, removing the decayed Austro Hungarian, Chinese, and Turkish Imperial players from the chess board and making room for the modern big guns to step up in Phase Two.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Alright, a hundred years back is a bad example. Let’s do two hundred years then, in… 1814…
OK, 1714… 1614… Jeez… 1514, well, let’s just say things in the present might not be as dire, loathsome, or squamous as we might believe them to be. Things could be a lot worse. An invasion fleet of alien starships could be driving asteroids at us from just beyond Mars, shelling our cities and killing the oceans. There could be bacterial analogues, born in the horrible mouldering slopes of an alien world, festering in the throats and orifices of our livestock or offspring.
Of course, were some star born army of conquerors to arrive upon the earth with lascivious or malicious intent, tiger riding Russian troops will be there to answer them.
I think that’s fairly obvious.
There are two public Newtown Creek walking tours coming up,
one in LIC, Queens and one in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.
Glittering Realms: Brooklyn’s Greenpoint with Atlas Obscura, on Saturday May 17th.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
Modern Corridor: Queen’s LIC with Brooklyn Brainery, on Sunday May 18th.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
hastily blocked
As Johnny Cash said “I been everywhere, man.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Over the last few weeks, your humble narrator has found himself wandering through every borough, except the Bronx, and many marvels have been witnessed. Let’s face it, if your eyes are open, NYC is in fact a place of wonders. Just have to learn how to see, and remember not to get jaded by it all. An annoying trait shared by all members of the human infestation hereabouts is to render the familiar as ordinary, and to accept the built environment as pedestrian or ordinary.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This is Hamilton Avenue, down by the Gowanus, which is one of the many spots in NYC which strike one such as myself dumb. The aggregate hours of human activity required to create a spot like this, just producing the steel and concrete which form the high flying Gowanus Expressway above or the draw bridge below, leaves me aghast.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My beloved Newtown Creek, seen at night from the Pulaski Bridge, reveals trillions of hours of planning and work. The shield wall of Manhattan notwithstanding, this tableau visualizes the complete reshaping of a waterway to suit the needs of men, and for one such as myself – the absence of historic bridges and the unseen presence of an entire subway line are keenly felt. Wow.
There are two public Newtown Creek walking tours coming up, one in Queens and one that walks the currently undefended border of the two boroughs.
DUPBO, with Newtown Creek Alliance and MAS Janeswalk, on May 3rd.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
Modern Corridor, with Brooklyn Brainery, on May 18th.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
watching eye
Big rigs of Queens in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As mentioned earlier in the week, the Newtown Creek Alliance’s Plank Road project has drawn me over to Maspeth few times in recent weeks, which is always fun for me as your humble narrator is an infrastructure geek who loves taking photos of enormous machines. Luckily, for me, Maspeth’s cup doth runneth over in this department.
This ain’t so lucky for the folks who live in Maspeth, of course, but that’s another story.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s some sort of truck mechanic nearby the Plank Road, or 54th road if you insist on using modern terminology, and one routinely sights the sort of heavily armored and freshly washed rigs like the ones in today’s post parked about. Don’t know much about this business, but these are some of the many, many trucks plying area streets that have caused groups like C.O.M.E.T. (in Queens) and OUTRAGE (in Brooklyn) to organize and demand relief.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The folks at OUTRAGE have clocked as many as 300 trucks of this size moving down nearby Metropolitan Avenue during the morning rush, and the toll they take on area streets is well known. Additionally, the MTA’s Grand Avenue facility a block away is an eventual destination for the entire bus fleet of Brooklyn. Add in the nearby LIE and BQE highways… well you get the idea.
There’s a series of studies out there which attempt to tie this truck traffic to higher rates of asthma in the corridors they travel, but the statistical information could (and has been) just as easily interpreted to damn City operated bus lines as well.
Either way, there’s a lot of traffic moving about, and all the while – the possibilities of rail and barge transport are being ignored.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Some of my friends in Queens get after me about supporting the enhanced usage of the rail system, and they make a good point that I don’t live in Ridgewood/Maspeth/Middle Village where all these trains transit through on their way to the rail depot at Fresh Pond. I do live two blocks away from the Sunnyside Yard, which is the busiest rail interchange in New York City, but I’m told that I apparently don’t know what I’m talking about – which seems to be a recurring theme in my life.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This packer truck is over in Long Island City, and was posed so provocatively while illegally parked on the median, that I couldn’t resist adding it in to this post.
There are three public Newtown Creek walking tours coming up, one in Queens and one in Brooklyn and two that walk the currently undefended border of the two boroughs.
Poison Cauldron, with Atlas Obscura, on April 26th.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
DUPBO, with Newtown Creek Alliance and MAS Janeswalk, on May 3rd.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
Modern Corridor, with Brooklyn Brainery, on May 18th.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
shall vex
A baited trap, in LIC.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Everyone knows about the particular predilection that the Gendarme has for those toroids of fried and sweetened dough which are commonly called Donuts, and it is simply “messed up” that someone seems to using one as bait. Should a hungry constable happen along and happily reach for this confection, what sort of snare might be triggered? Is this a cop trap of some kind? What’s hidden inside that duct or pipe?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The funny thing about the cop/donut myth is that it really isn’t true. Most of the police officers I’ve met over the years were actually in pretty good shape, and the ones who weren’t in wholesome condition owed it to a love of the brewer’s art rather than that of the baker’s. Still one wonders how many innocent but hungry servants of the realm hereabouts have been ensnared on this LIC block, adjoining Skillman Avenue?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Commonly held, the mythology about American Police and their love for donuts is reasonably predicated upon the frequent observation of unit cars and uniformed personnel, by the citizenry at large, congregating at locations commonly called “Donut Shops.” Simply answered, even if your job is to drive around a neighborhood for eight hours at a pop, you still need to pee and or buy coffee periodically – an endless cycle in itself – and sharing a common location for such activity allows units to compare notes on the days events. Donut shops are open late, as are the Police. It’s messed up that someone is setting out donut baited snares though, and provides for a worrisome development within this, our Newtown Pentacle.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
frantically begging
Those cool firemen from Williamsburg, spotted in Blissville, Queens.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A humble narrator does like hisself a fire truck – and having never surrendered the childhood desire to run along the sidewalk screaming “firemen, firemen” when a fire truck goes by – when a Brooklyn based unit comes screaming out of a fire house in Blissville – it catches my eye. For some reason, 108 came out of the Ladder 128 house on Greenpoint Avenue – obviously on a call. My confusion is based on the fact that one normally expects Ladder 108 to deploy via Union Avenue in Brooklyn.
from nyfd.com
History: Ladder 108 Ladder Co. 108, now quartered at 187 Union Ave., Williamsburg, Brooklyn, began life as Hook & Ladder Co. 8 in the old City of Brooklyn Fire Department at 112 Siegel Street near Graham Avenue on November 30, 1887. During this time, to be distinctive, the Brooklyn Fire Department used two-tone green on their apparatus, while F.D.N.Y. apparatus was red. Green continued to be used until consolidation of the five bouroughs in 1898. On January 1, 1898, Ladder Company became part of the Fire Department of the City of New York. It was renumbered as Ladder Company 58 on October 1, 1899. It was not until January 1, 1913, that Ladder 58 was renumbered as Ladder Company 108. In the 110 years of Ladder 108’s existence, two members lost their lives in the line of duty. A fire in Queens on March 2, 1905, took the life of Lt. George McGeary and 27 years later on May 2, 1932, Firefighter Joseph LaGrange was killed when Ladder 108 and Engine 213 collided responding to a false alarm and Firefighter LaGrange was thrown to the street. Ladder 108’s tenure at 112 Siegel Street lasted 84 years and on August 9, 1971, 108 truck moved to a new firehouse at 187 Union Avenue and is still quartered there.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Of course, the ways and means and mores common to those “firemen, firemen” are many and complex, so no profit can be realized by analyzing their methods. Luckily, one had the opportunity to crack out a few shots of the hurtling ladder truck as it sped along past the walls of Calvary.
from wikipedia
FDNY Ladder Companies (also known as Truck Companies) are tasked with search and rescue, forcible entry, and ventilation at the scene of a fire. A Ladder Company can operate three types of Ladder Trucks: an Aerial Ladder Truck, equipped with a 100′ aerial ladder mounted at the rear of the apparatus; a Tower Ladder Truck, equipped with either a 75′ or 95′ telescoping boom and bucket mounted in the center of the apparatus; a Tractor Drawn Aerial Ladder Truck, or Tiller/Tractor Trailer, equipped with a 100′ aerial ladder. A Ladder Company carries various forcible entry, ventilation, and rescue tools to deal with an assortment of fires and emergencies, including motor vehicle accidents.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Can’t help but wonder where Ladder 128 was, maybe they loaded the truck up and drove to Florida for a vacation or something. I like the idea of a whole crew just taking off for a few days, pulling into 711 parking lots along I-95 for toilet breaks and microwave burritos. The random appearance of NYC vehicles in other parts of the country – a taxi or a police car for instance – would be positively dada.
from dnainfo.com
Police officers inside the 90th Precinct were in just the right spot for such an emergency — someone from the station house simply ran next door to report the fire to Battalion 35 Engine 216 and Ladder 108. The firehouse shares a city building on a Williamsburg block with the NYPD.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 