Posts Tagged ‘newtown creek’
portentous meanings
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One found himself at the Maspeth Avenue Plank Road site recently, attending and photographing a Newtown Creek Alliance cleanup event that occurred on a lovely Saturday afternoon. One of the property owners nearby this site has recently been compelled to do some remodeling of their shoreline. I’ve known about this for a bit, but given that I’m usually here either at sunset or after dark, haven’t explored the new situation.
It’s not a good idea to be poking around in the bushes after dark in Industrial Maspeth, and especially so if you’re on foot and alone. Given that NCA had a fairly large group here, scooping garbage and debris off of the shoreline, I figured “why not?”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The shoreline in this spot has been fairly impassable during my years at Newtown Creek, and largely ignored by the industrial operation which worked busily on the other side of a large concrete and steel fence. An artist I know had briefly set up a small structure back here which he used as a hangout and ad hoc painting studio. That structure had been taken over by some mendicant in the last year or two. Artist, structure, and mendicant are all gone now and there’s all sorts of geographically appropriate plantings here now.
This is where I got into the fight with a raccoon back in 2020, during which I had to poke at the thing with my tripod.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the mouth of English Kills, the Newtown Creek tributary that flows all the way back to Johnson Avenue in Bushwick. It’s also where water quality along the Creek sharply drops off. If you think Newtown Creek is bad, as everybody including the Federal Government does, you should see English Kills. Yuck.
Back tomorrow with more from my beloved Creek.
“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.
cloudy throne
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’m not joking when I say that I’m obsessed with that little tree which is growing out from under a factory building in Long Island City, along the banks of Newtown Creek’s Dutch Kills tributary. One feared, during a post deluge walk, that it might have become unrooted due to the heavy rain but there it was. It’s passed from being a tree to being a metaphor for me. Nature wins, ultimately, no matter how hard we try – nature wins.
Hope, basically. It represents hope to me.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It’s why we should be striving to enslave the insects to do our bidding. Imagine commanding armies of ants or termites. It’s just a matter of figuring out their pheromone language and changing their marching orders. Ants can move mountains, one particle of sand at a time. Give me enough indentured ants and I’ll change the course of the Hudson.
To get started – we’ll just need a bag of sugar, a laptop, and a couple of lengths of copper speaker wire. Yeah, eventually we’ll need an AI to act as the Queen, but one thing at a time – huh?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I don’t know why I automatically go to “mad science” as my solution for intractable problems. I have a friend who’s the kind of scientist who does horrible things to monkeys at work (for good reasons, as he’s trying to cure blindness, but it’s still a pretty grim laboratory setup). I’ve asked him if the “science industry” has any sort of safeguards against he or his colleagues going rogue. If you notice your co worker has a human hand wired to a computer, for instance, is there an 800 number to call?
The answer, after he finished laughing about the term “science industry,” was no. There are no restrictive or societal rules against mad science. Order your Tesla coils, lords and ladies, the sky’s the limit.
“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.
persistently haunted
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As mentioned in Friday’s post, a humble narrator set out for Greenpoint’s “Penny Bridge” street end to capture a few sunset shots. What with the heat and all the rain we’ve been having, it’s been difficult to find the right time and get to the right place. Penny Bridge is at the foot of Meeker Avenue, incidentally, where there used to be a crossing to Queens. The Penny Bridge, as it was called, was demolished in 1939 when the original Kosciuszcko Bridge opened. My pals at Newtown Creek Alliance have been looking after this spot, and have even installed a bit of historic signage about Penny Bridge. If you visit, be careful with the everpresent mud found there, as it’s quite slippery.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The mud clogs up a sewer grate, meaning that there’s also always a giant puddle of super nasty water. Luckily, this allows what seems like a billion mosquitoes a place to breed. That’s the good stuff, I tell’s ya.
The night I was at Penny Bridge was about 24 hours after Tropical Storm Henri blew through the City, and my beloved Newtown Creek was particularly aromatic. The “licking a battery” smell of raw sewage was prevalent due to the Combjned Sewer Outfall system. Mixed into the aroma was a distinctly petrochemical perfume, and the nearby waste transfer stations that handle municipal refuse were introducing the scent of wet garbage into the atmospheric cocktail. Never has Anosmia sounded so good, thought I.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The weird emanate of light from the Kosciuszcko Bridge paints the landscape of the Newtown Creek with a lacquer of surreal and over saturated colors. The hues and intensity of the bridge’s lights are like no earthly color. Instead, they are not like some colour out of space or anything, instead they remind one of a certain Greek coffee shop back home in Astoria.
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.
tilted simultanously
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One found himself at the Penny Bridge site in Greenpoint recently, along the fabulous Newtown Creek, when the Tug Mary H labored past. She was towing a fuel barge, which was likely headed for the Bayside Fuel Terminal on Metropolitan Avenue nearby the eponymous bridge.
By me, this is exciting stuff.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It’s moments like these that all of the low light shooting I’ve been doing for the last few years pays forward. Seriously, would not have been able to capture anything close to this with my old camera.
Luckily, the thing was already up on the tripod, since I had come out here specifically for the sunset period of the day. Funnily, the tripod actually limited what I could capture, but that’s where the low light capability of the new camera sings.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As mentioned in the past, it doesn’t matter if a tugboat is pushing or pulling, it’s called “towing.” Next week, I’ll show you the sunset shots, but for now, I’m not sure what the next few days hold. Looks like the heat is going to break and that’s going to bring a bunch of storms into play, but I’m anxious to try out the new NYC Ferry Staten Island Route. The plan is to take the 7 to the 34th street dock, ride to St. George, get on the big orange boat and head back to Manny Hatty. Once in the City, I’ll shop over to Pier 11 and head back home via the Astoria route.
That’s me, I now commute for fun.
“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.
strange tributes
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Dutch Kills is a tributary of the fearsome Newtown Creek, a Federal Superfund site some 3.8 miles long that provides a border for the New York City Boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens for the first three miles of its course. The waterway is polluted by industry and open sewers, and there’s a bed of sediment at the bottom composed of coal tar, petroleum derivates, human waste, and everything else that’s ever fallen into the water. This sediment is called “Black Mayonnaise.” The Dutch Kills tributary branches off of the main waterway about 3/4 of a mile from its intersection with the East River, flows entirely within the confines of Long Island City, and is about .7 – .8 of a mile long.
I’m obsessed with that little tree growing out from under a factory along the bulkheads. It’s a Tree of Paradise aka “Princess Tree,” I’m told.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
All of those little streaks in the water, along the rotting bulkheads which I focused in on, are fishies. What you can hear at night, from all over this industrial canal, are the slaps and splashes of predator fish picking off these little bug eaters who gather around light sources. You can also hear passing ATV’s and muscle cars with modified exhaust systems, but that’s a different post.
I spent a bit of time hereabouts recently, waving the camera around and investigating what might be hiding in the shadows at Dutch Kills. As long time readers here at Newtown Pentacle will attest, a humble narrator is endlessly fascinated by this section of the greater Newtown Creek.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Water fowl, these Canada Geese are dicks. All Canada Geese are dicks, and I’m racist towards them. Specist, actually, I guess. At the very least, I’m extremely prejudiced against them.
Wow, remember when there was a difference between prejudiced and racist, as in there was a level of severity for being an asshole to other people? I was having a conversation with a younger friend of mine about this lately, one which centered on how you bleed pressure out of a closed system. There’s different levels of murder, for instance – manslaughter, homicide, etc.
At any rate, the Canada Geese are ultimately downy piles of meat, and what I was doing at Dutch Kills on this warm night was searching for a carnivore which legends say hunt these waters. Looking for a hunter? Focus in on the prey.
“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 