Posts Tagged ‘New York City’
frightened messengers
Massing, massing, massive – in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Just a few days ago, one found himself walking towards Hunters Point via the Northern Blvd./Jackson Avenue route which I refer to as “the Carridor.” I was heading for a public safety meeting, regarding the East River parks in Hunters Point, and as is my habit – the opportunity to stretch my legs and get a bit of exercise was seized.
Whenever I’ve taken this walk over the last couple of years, one thought seems to predominate as I cast my gaze around – “they’ve stolen the sky.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The sky has been stolen, or horse traded away, by the Real Estate people in collusion with the short term thinkers who populate City Hall – of course – but ultimately, who did they steal it from? Did anyone used to own the sky in Western Queens?
Definitively, somebody does own the sky now.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The area around Queens Plaza and Court Square, in particular, has become a shadowed warren of glassy towers.
At the public safety meeting in Hunters Point, which was called due to a disturbing allegation of a rape occurring in Gantry Plaza State Park, the residents of the new buildings surrounding the waterfront had a chance to speak and offer their complaints about this and that.
Most of their comments boiled down to “I’ve lived here for twenty minutes, and this isn’t what the realtor told me it would be like.” Nobody told them that the Borough Motto was “Welcome to Queens, now go fuck yourself” it seems.
The tower people mainly offered quality of life complaints to the panel at the front of the room which included Jimmy Van Bramer and representatives of the Hunters Point Parks Conservancy as well as the various branches of law enforcement who have jurisdiction over the parks.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
You can barely spot the Citi Megalith anymore, which once stood as a lone sentinel.
The impossible thing which cannot possibly exist that lurks in its cupola… with its unblinking three lobed burning eye… no longer has an unoccluded view of the world below.
Upcoming Events and Tours
Wednesday, August 24, 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. –
Port Newark Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
acrid smoke
Tremulous skies and clean underwear, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That crazy heat wave which we all suffered through last week produced a series of powerful afternoon and evening thunder storms here in Astoria. The skies were so interesting and dynamic that one felt compelled to record the scene.
Pictured above was a worrisome looking funnel cloud that formed up to the east, and on the right hand side of the shot you can see the wall of rain pushing in from the west.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Another day (or night actually), and another thunderstorm formed up. For this one I was at home on my porch. Psyched to actually capture the bolt of lightning seen above (it’s harder than you would think to photograph lightning without certain specialized trigger devices) one suddenly realized that I was standing next to a chain link fence during a lightning storm and was in a particularly exposed position.
Suddenly, my underwear didn’t feel so clean.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I found myself a slightly safer spot, under something, and continued to crack out shots of the approaching deluge. Likely, I was deluding myself as to being safer, but regardless I felt a bit less exposed to the elemental fury that was approaching.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On a completely different note, while in the financial district of lower Manhattan last week, the van pictured above was spotted.
Clean underwear on demand is its promise, which is something I think we should all aspire to, especially during stormy weather.
Upcoming Events and Tours
Wednesday, August 24, 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. –
Port Newark Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
stark madness
so… I’m on the East River last Thursday…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A “travlin man,” your humble narrator had some business to attend to in Greenpoint last Thursday which was meant to be followed by helping out on a Working Harbor Committee excursion in the evening. The WHC trip was leaving from Lower Manhattan’s Pier 11, so the logical path was to catch the East River Ferry from Brooklyn to the City. While onboard, I spotted something fairly curious.
Is that the nose of a submarine being towed on a barge?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The tug doing the towing was the GT Lyman. As is usually the case, tugboatinformation.com has everything you’d want to know about the Lyman on display at their site. To sum up – she was built in 1968, is owned and operated by Delaware’s Gateway Towing, and can normally be found in the waters around Philadelphia.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
What Lyman was towing looks very much – to me at least – to be the front section of a submarine. Maybe I’m being crazy here, but there’s a conning tower and… that’s a submarine.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Now, I’ve taken lots of shots around NY Harbor but I’ve never taken a photo of a submarine before.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Actually, I probably have, but pictured above is what you’d normally get in a shot of a submarine.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One was kind of hoping that the Lyman was going to execute a turn into the Brooklyn Navy Yard, but it continued heading north along the East River.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
File this post under “You don’t see that every day.”
Upcoming Events and Tours
Wednesday, August 24, 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. –
Port Newark Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
leaping shadows
Lets talk about the Kosciuszcko Bridge, huh?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Since the big bridge over Newtown Creek’s 77th birthday is coming up – August 23rd for the vulgarly curious – one decided to walk over and through Calvary Cemetery into West Maspeth the other day and check out the latest progress which the NYS DOT and their contractors are making on replacing it. The Kosciuszcko Bridge replacement project is humming along.
As a note, this post represents no special access or anything, just some specialized knowledge about Newtown Creek and the points of view thereupon which I am privy to. If there’s an angle of view on the Creek I don’t know about by this point, I will buy you a drink for showing it to me.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As is my habit, one has been keeping a running tally of posts about the project.
To start – this 2012 post tells you everything you could want to know about Robert Moses, Fiorella LaGuardia, and the origins of the 1939 model Kosciuszko Bridge. Just before construction started, I swept through both the Brooklyn and Queens sides of Newtown Creek in the area I call “DUKBO” – Down Under the Kosciuszko Bridge Onramp. Here’s a 2014 post, and another, showing what things used to look like on the Brooklyn side, and one dating back to 2010, and from 2012 discussing the Queens side – this. Construction started, and this 2014 post offers a look at things. There’s shots from the water of Newtown Creek, in this June 2015 post, and in this September 2015 post, which shows the bridge support towers rising. Additionally, this post from March of 2016 detailed the action on the Queens side. Most recently, here’s one from May of 2016, and one from June of the same year.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The roadway which will be the easterly BQE section leading out of Queens is now largely in place. There’s still a bunch of work going on up there, presumptively it involves the sort of rebar work observed in the May 2016 post linked to above.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The shape of the cable stay section of the new bridge is beginning to form up as well.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The steel sections are prefabricated and shipped to the job site via flat bed truck, where they’re then hoisted up and attached to the towers and cables.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking down 56th road from Blissville into Maspeth. The area in the left hand side of the shot used to be an NYPD tow yard, which was a great example of NYC’s macabre sense of humor. NYPD tow pounds are typically in places which you can’t reach without a car, and since they’ve just taken your car…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking north towards Sunnyside from 56th road. You can really discern the difference in height between the 1939 and modern bridges in the shot above. Apparently, part of the traffic engineering underlying the new bridge project is to eliminate the steep incline from the approaches.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking south towards Brooklyn, while still on 56th road. The property fence line I’m shooting over is the former home of the Phelps Dodge refinery, which is said to be a particularly toxic hot spot.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A bit closer to the water, on another part of the former Phelps Dodge properties which isn’t quite so “hot,” pollution wise. This is the parking lot of a wholesaler catering to the restaurant trade.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The cable stay span of the new bridge is growing steadily towards Brooklyn in the shot above. To me, it looks like it’s going to be connected to the Brooklyn side ramp fairly soon.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A close up on the ramp, and you can see the itty bitty construction guys at work right on the edge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Same perspective, but wide angle. That’s the Newtown Creek flowing below, and we are looking west towards Manhattan. Again, notice the height differential between the two spans.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking south again, this time from Maspeth’s 43rd street. The contractors have a lot of their equipment and prefabricated materials staged out here.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Back on 43rd street, but this time from the very edge of the project site, looking south along the spine of the BQE.
There you are.
Upcoming Events and Tours
Sunday, August 14th, 11:00 p.m. – 1:00 p.m. –
Calvary Cemetery Walking Tour,
with Atlas Obscura. Click here for more details.
Sunday, August 21, 11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. –
Poison Cauldron Walking Tour,
with Atlas Obscura. Click here for more details.
Wednesday, August 24, 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. –
Port Newark Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
curious explanations
Neither here nor there, and feeling pretty burnt out.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One was out and about conducting a tour of Greenpoint’s East River and Newtown Creek coasts when a vast amount of smoke was noticed rising out of Sunnyside last week. Some of the members of my group engaged their portable data terminals to inquire about the plume, and it emerged that there was a warehouse fire underway on 37th street near the corner of Queens Blvd. Having missed the actual conflagration, one did happen to wander past the aftermath the next day and a few shots were gathered.
Oddly enough, FDNY was still on scene, no doubt in cautious anticipation of flare ups in the still hot rubble. Luckily for the fire fellas, the fire took place directly across the street from Gallagher’s gentlemens club, cause y’know, for when you need to use the toilet or something.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It would be a show of serious remiss for me to not mention that one of the firefighters on scene was perhaps the largest human being I’ve ever seen. I’m talking pro wrestler big. I’m talking David vs Goliath big, Batman big. Like seven feet tall and pure muscle big, He was taller than De Blasio big.
I’m talking “he claps his hands to put out fires, like the Hulk” big.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
By all reports, this was a fairly huge conflagration, and even the biggest fireman in the world wouldn’t be able to do anything but contain and control the blaze. The company based in the one story warehouse style building hereabouts was involved in the cabinetry business, I’m led to believe, and the raw materials stored in the structure were all wood based – which the FDNY would refer to simply as “fuel.” My buddies over at the Sunnyside Post were on scene during the event.
Check out their shots and videos of the raging fire here.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I can tell you that the day after the fire, the smoot smell of burnt wood still stained the air, but that the businesses next door were open for business. For those of you reading this who live in North Brooklyn, I’m sure you’ve already done the math on what probably happened here, based on experience.
Long story short, the real estate guys have been eying this still industrial stretch of Queens Boulevard for a while now, and their interest in an area usually renders it quite combustible.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My prediction for the next decade – based around what I’ve seen in LIC, Williamsburg, and Greenpoint over the last decade and a half – is that the industrial neighborhoods surrounding the Sunnyside Yards are going to be seeing a lot of largish fires occurring. The great thing about immolation is that it’s so costly to repair a burned up structure that the only sensible thing to do is to declare it a total loss and sell the land to a developer.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Truly, we are doomed by the ambitions of our lessers and their base short term desires. It’s all so depressing, and it leaves me (and us) totally burned out.
Like a leaf, you.
Upcoming Events and Tours
Sunday, August 14th, 11:00 p.m. – 1:00 p.m. –
Calvary Cemetery Walking Tour,
with Atlas Obscura. Click here for more details.
Sunday, August 21, 11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. –
Poison Cauldron Walking Tour,
with Atlas Obscura. Click here for more details.
Wednesday, August 24, 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. –
Port Newark Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 