Posts Tagged ‘Long Island City’
parabolic 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:paragraphplumbed descent
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Scuttling, always scuttling. Camera in hand, filthy black raincoat flapping about in the poison wind, sometimes the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself hangs pregnantly in the vault of the sky.
I knew this was going to be kind of a long day for me, so my first steps involved using the Subway to cut a bit of walking off of the trip. The R carried me east to Jackson Heights, where a transfer to the 7 was enacted and one proceeded westward. My ultimate destination was the same place where every other bit of wind blown garbage goes – Newtown Creek. Specifically, the Dutch Kills tributary of the larger waterway found in Long Island City. One exited the Subway system at the Hunters Point Avenue stop and got busy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My first stop was to check in on the collapsing bulkhead along 29th street. Said collapse is causing the underpinnings of the adjoining roadway, the aforementioned 29th street, to empty out into the waterway. This is called undermining.
So far, my pals at Newtown Creek Alliance and I have managed to activate every single elected official in western Queens, from Borough President to dog catcher, about this issue. Interested in reading the actual signed letter we sent to Janno Lieber at MTA about the bulkhead? Click here for a Google docs link.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The odyssey since has involved a bunch of lawyers and an admission from MTA that this is, indeed, their property. No tangible or material progress has manifested itself yet, because the lawyers are still lawyering, and luckily the street hasn’t collapsed in on itself while we’re waiting for them to finish all that stuff up. Yet.
Nothing matters, and nobody cares.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My “artsy fartsy” section of the day could commence, after having captured reference shots of the bulkhead to show to the various entities who might own it or have a regulatory stake in it, one headed over to the Montauk Cutoff. It was, after all, nearly time for sunset.
I’m not one of those photographers who only shoot during sunrise or sunset, but if the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself is about to paint the sky with color, and you’re already out…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s Cabin M, the “abandoned” railroad drawbridge which is part of the Degnon Terminal Railway – aka the LIRR’s Montauk Cutoff – a similarly “abandoned” rail spur that used to connect Long Island Railroad’s Lower Montauk tracks along Newtown Creek to the nearby Sunnyside Yards, and the LIRR Main Line leading to Woodside and Jamaica. The reason MTA owns that bulkhead on 29th street is due to the bankruptcy of the national Penn Central Railroad company, which by the 1960’s owned LIRR and all the other private rail spurs in Long Island City. Richard Nixon nationalized the assets of Penn Central, with its passenger service becoming Amtrak and its freight business becoming Conrail, and their intra city or commuter rail operation was given to the states. Philadelphia created SEPTA, Massachusetts established the MBTA, and here in New York – Governor Nelson Rockefeller created the MTA. Rockefeller combined the bankrupt New York City Transit Authority’s Subway and Bus operations, as well as the profitable bridges and tunnels which he stole away from Robert Moses, into what he dubbed as the “MTA.”
Believe it or not – the paragraph above is a quick summary. I did a video about Sunnyside Yards a few years ago that discusses this complicated saga in some detail – click here for a YouTube link.
Cabin M, like the 29th street bulkhead, is infrastructure which MTA didn’t design or build but they’re responsible for maintaining it – maybe. Like I said, lawyers are lawyering.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s DB Cabin, a swing bridge which sits at the mouth of the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek. Before you ask, “Cabin” is railroad talk, I don’t know. The bridge connects two Lower Montauk track rail yards – Wheelspur and Blissville. Best date I’ve been able to find for it being built was 1919, but this structure replaced earlier ones. There’s been railroad tracks in this zone since at least the late 1860’s. Definitively, the date for rail in this zone – connecting Jamaica to the east with the industrial heartlands of Newtown Creek in Maspeth, Bushwick, and Ridgewood to the East River in the west is 1870.
Back next week with more, at this, your Newtown Pentacle.
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.
inappropriately enrobed
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Another night, another scuttle. This was a longish sort of walk. Starting in Astoria, along Broadway in the 40’s, I carried the camera into Sunnyside, then Long Island City, Blissville, and into industrial Maspeth. What fun.
First up was a stop at “ole reliable,” an oft visited fence hole at the Sunnyside Yards, one which provides a great point of view on the Harold Interlocking. The busiest passenger train junction in the United States, this spot is where both Long Island Railroad and Amtrak pass through on their way to and from Penn Station.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A taxi company in Sunnyside is based in a structure reminiscent of the sort of early 1970’s toys that little boys craved. They have ramps and lifts and pipes that bellow steam. Also, since every parking spot on the blocks surrounding this company is claimed by one of their cabs, I don’t feel guilty peeing in between two of their taxis so it’s a bit of a destination.
One of the weird leave behinds of my experiences during the Covid period relates to the fact that the very few places you used to be able to piss – a McDonald’s or Diner bathroom for instance – have been closed and off limits. This means that I’ve gotten into the habit of “taking care of business” in the manner of a domestic dog. This has become a bit of an issue for me during the various travels to other cities detailed in earlier posts, as the citizenry of other communities generally take a dim view of such practices. Well, you can take the boy out of the dystopian shithole…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My fascination with gas stations is another Covid period “thing.” To be fair, though, they’re very difficult subjects to photograph in low light – just like the LIRR train in the first shot – and that sort of camera related challenge draws me in like a moth to a candle’s flame.
At the start of Covid, we had pantry moths show up in the house. They arrived in a bag of dry dog food. It took the better part of two years to exterminate the little bastards using pheromone scented traps. Freaking Lepidoptera.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Queens Boulevard, the so called “boulevard of death,” was crossed next, and south did a humble narrator walk. Given that the streets of Queens aren’t quite as “crime lite” as they were a few years ago, one has renounced the habit of listening to audiobooks or music via headphones. I want to be able to hear someone’s sneakers slapping the pavement as they’re coming for me.
It’s actually amazing how quickly the entire City fell apart under the rule of De Blasio and his fellow fun lovers. Mr. Fairness and Equity oversaw a widening of the gap between rich and poor, an explosion of racially motivated crimes directed towards people of Asian descent, and every time he opened his mouth he would piss somebody off. Truly, that man was the Trump of the left. Incompetent, high on his own supply, and every opportunity to learn something new was rejected in favor of an ideological interpretation. At least Adams is fun.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Blissville, a section of Long Island City which borders industrial Maspeth, was the next place to be blighted by my foot steps. Blissville in the centuried home of First Calvary Cemetery, the polyandrion of the Roman Catholics. As a note – I never cross a fence line, and almost never trespass. The shot above was instead captured from the public way’s POV and I used the stout iron fences of the cemetery to steady the camera.
The mausolea pictured above is sort of unusual for a Catholic cemetery. The human remains encapsulated aren’t in the ground, rather they seem to reside within the granite capsule guarded by the Angel statue. Normally, the Catholics use the loam for the disbursement of their departed, burying the box (coffin or casket) about six feet down. Jews do the same, except when it comes to Mausolea. In Jewish funerary tradition, a mausoleum shelf or compartment is meant to be lined with soil from the Levant (Israel) prior to the placement of the box and its dearly departed cargo. Yes, it’s a racket.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Having fairly exhausted myself, after arriving at the “Crane District” of Industrial Maspeth, one summoned a ride share service to cart my sorry butt back home to Astoria. As mentioned in the past, I seem to have developed some brand loyalty towards the LYFT service as opposed to the Uber one.
One of my practices is to use a subway or bus or cab to deposit me somewhere, and then walk back to Astoria from… say… Flushing or Bushwick. This is something I started doing back before Covid, in fact. It vastly increases what I would consider to be walking distance, since the trip is sort of one way.
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.
hollow betwixt
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Another brutally cold night, another short walk. This one was routed from HQ, along Astoria’s Broadway in the 40’s, to 31st street and then to Astoria Boulevard, and since my feet were still in a kicking mood, all the way to Skillman Avenue in Long Island City. About three to four miles, all told, I’d guess. I really don’t keep track as I trek.
Occasionally I’ll check the “health” app on my phone. It has a wildly inaccurate step counter, but often offers interesting observations about your movements. Apparently, I’ve got a 6.2% limp related to my left leg, which jibes with all the bitching and moaning about “my trick left foot” that I’ve subjected you all to since 2019, when a falling planter shattered the big toe of my left foot.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Incidentally – I’m still marinating about the NYC DOT representatives who told me, in response to a service request offered through the local Community Board’s Transportation Committee – which I’m the chair of – that 31st street has perfectly adequate street lighting. Sigh. Nothing matters, and nobody cares.
The next corner north currently hosts the Neptune Diner and a Staples store. Both will be demolished this year to make room for a luxury condo tower or two which will climb dozens of stories into the sky. Now – I too have always been desirous of living along the Grand Central Parkway at its junction with the Triborough Bridge, and a particularly noisy elevated subway track would be a bonus, but my bet is that when the rich people show up it’s going to become a priority to do something about the dark and dangerous 31st street corridor lighting situation.
Fuck you, very much.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Another prognosis I will offer is that once the Neptune project gets going, the smell of blood in the water will draw out all of the smaller Real Estate sharks and shit flies. They will hunt along Astoria Blvd., I imagine. Gas Stations and supermarkets, due to the size of the property lots they inhabit, are prime targets for these sort of creatures.
Astoria is beginning a process, once that’s just finishing up in Hunters Point, Court Square, and Queens Plaza, and Williamsburg, and Greenpoint. The only thing saving us right now are high interest rates and other inflationary factors. As soon as there’s cheap credit again, the bulldozers will begin to arrive, and the sky will be privatized.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One turned his heels at 46th street, where realization that I hadn’t taken any photos of a recently renovated playground set in. Before this renovation took place, this playground – and especially its grassy edges – were beloved by my sorely missed and dearly departed doggie Zuzu. The joke was “Zuzu’s checking her pee mail,” when we would slowly walk around the edges of the place, with her sniffing and inspecting every tree and blade of grass for neighborhood’s dog to dog news.
As mentioned, it was quite cold but being well wrapped, I kept on scuttling. Why not?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One marched across Northern Blvd. and soon found myself at one of my “go-to” fence holes nearby the Harold Interlocking. Lucky timing saw me arriving just as a Long Island Railroad train was passing through.
It was right about here that I decided on my “turn around” point. I was beginning to feel a bit of fatigue, which – like all french words – I intentionally mispronounce as “Fatygway.” If you’re from the part of Brooklyn that I am, mispronunciation of France Talk is a form of sport. “Hors d’oeuvres” is meant to pronounced as “whores da overs,” ain’t it? C’mon, Bro.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My turnaround point was for a spot where it’s entirely kosher for a privately owned taxi company to gobble up every available parking spot to store their fleet. Ever notice you don’t hear the safe streets crowd complaining about this form of “free car storage”? Wonder why that is?
More tomorrow at this – your Newtown Pentacle.
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.
shimmers afar
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Scuttling always scuttling, camera in hand, filthy black raincoat flapping wildly about in the wind. Sometimes it’s really, really cold.
A bit of housekeeping, firstly. For the next few weeks you’re going to be seeing six image posts. One has been unusually motivated and somewhat prolific in recent months, and there are an abundance of images which I’m anxious to share. Problem is that I’m quite out of step with the calendar and if I was to continue doing the traditional three image posts, you’d still be seeing snow on the ground as late as June. Accordingly, six image posts are on the menu for an interval.
That’s the Long Island Railroad passing through the Harold Interlocking at Sunnyside Yards, in Long Island City, pictured above in a photo captured on the 5th of February of 2022.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This was one of my short walks, a constitutional, if you will. One left HQ in Astoria, scuttled south over the Honeywell Street Truss Bridge that crosses over the rail yard, and then over to Queens Boulevard. The shot above was captured nearby Queens Boulevard’s very busy intersection with Van Dam Street.
One was quite distracted while gathering this one, as some bloke decided that I was very interesting and he had maintained a constant position roughly 20 feet away from me and parallel to my back for a few blocks. One was sort of waiting for him to come rushing at me, but when I turned around and gave him the patented “Mitch Waxman laser eyes” look, he lost interest and shuffled off to find an easier victim.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One was specifically trying to avoid visiting Newtown Creek or any of its tributaries for a change, so after having executed a confusion of evasion maneuvers to obfuscate any attempt that this fellow might enact to reacquire me as a target, I decided to stick to a few more commonly travelled places. A solid bit of 1980’s NYC advice I would offer – signal them so that they know that you know, keep moving, and don’t act like you wouldn’t be into fucking them up if they tried.
In future posts, we’ll explore – for those of you under the age of 40 – how to live with the existential dread of the Cold War and the threat of looming nuclear annihilation. If any of you have ever wondered the what’s and why’s of the paranoid psychology underlying the Baby Boomer and Generation X mentality, then welcome to the party kids. I’d suggest hitting the YouTube and watching “Threads” and then “The Day After” and then reconsidering the hardened black and white absolutism of your politics while embracing the singular fact that our world is painted in shades of gray. “Special Bulletin” also comes to mind… what?… how many episodes of “The Walking Dead” have you sat through? What do you think all those Zombie and Alien Invasion movies are really about?
The Cold War generations didn’t receive grief counseling or consolation, we got shelter drills and invented Punk Rock and Hip Hop. Go make some art, you’ll feel better.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The good news is that you’re looking at, in the shot above, what would probably be ground zero for a nuclear strike if the Russians actually decided to commit suicide and launch. I’ve heard from multiple sources that Sunnyside Yards is what that particular group of militarist apocalypse engineers use to target NYC. Russians don’t go for precision, they go for “Grozny,” a term which translates as terrible or horrible. The good news is that I live a few blocks from here and thereby it would all be over pretty quickly for me. Nanoseconds, in fact.
It wasn’t Ivan the Terrible, it was Ivan Grozny. “Russians don’t even trust themselves, so it’s folly to trust Russia as a country.” Bismarck said that. “Never trust a Russian, the only people they love – in their dog hearts – are the last ones who fed them.” My Ukrainian Jewish Grandmother said that one, and she once got to see a Cossack behead one of her brothers.
“You lost that Cold War feelin’
Whoa, that Cold War feelin’
You lost that Cold War feelin’
Now it’s gone, gone, gone, whoa-oh
Now there’s no welcome look in your eyes when I reach for you
And now you’re starting to criticize little things I do
It makes me just feel like crying
‘Cause baby, something beautiful’s dyin”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On a lighter note, I’ve been encountering all sorts of street furniture of late, here in Queens. I don’t mean street benches, utility poles, or fire hydrants by “street furniture,” I mean actual feral decor which has been released into the wild.
Pictured above is what I’d describe as a work desk, of the kind once used by mechanical engineers. What makes it cool is that little knobby thing on the side, which would allow you to adjust the angle of the work surface. I’ve still got my old drafting table folded up in a corner here at HQ.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Just up the block from the drafting desk, these seats were encountered. These look like the sort of seating you encounter in an airport bus, or one of those passenger vans that work as “dollar cars” along Flatbush Avenue. Or sitting out on a street in Astoria, I guess.
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.
The Newtown Pentacle 