Posts Tagged ‘ny harbor’
chill current
Maritime Sunday once more gurgles and splashes into port.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Joan Turecamo, IMO number 7902025, is a 392 ton Tug which was built in 1981 at the Matton Shipyard in Cohoes, NY. She’s owned and operated by the Moran Company, and was recently spotted while onboard a Working Harbor Committee “Newark Bay” tour.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
She was plying the poison waters of the Kill Van Kull, another one of the chemically complex industrial waterways that one such as myself calls home. Kill Van Kull has been referred to as “Tugboat Alley” more than once at this, your Newtown Pentacle, for the enormous number of towing and cargo vessels making their way to and from the titan Port Elizabeth Newark Port complex.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Moran tug was headed out to the larger harbor when spotted, and seemed to be under full steam while working against the current. A hearty maritime Sunday shout out is offered to the cast and crew of the tugboat Joan Turecamo.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday- September 28, 2013
Newtown Creek Boat Tour with the Working Harbor Committee- tickets on sale now.
Saturday – October 19, 2013
The Insalubrious Valley of the Newtown Creek with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale soon.
Sunday- October 20th, 2013
The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek with Brooklyn Brainery- tickets on sale now
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
last ounce
A short Maritime Sunday visit with the Vane Bros.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Vane Brothers’ brand new Tug Magothy recently rolled past me at the exit from Kill Van Kull, while onboard with the Working Harbor Committee. Vane started out as a Ships Chandlery in 1898, down in the port of Baltimore. They’ve become a towing company over the last century, and operate a fleet of tugs and barges in the ports of New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Norfolk, and Charleston.
from vanebrothers.com
The tug Magothy is the fourteenth in a line of Patapsco-class tugs. She was designed by Frank Basile of Entech & Associates, and is under construction at Thoma-Sea Boat Builders’ West Yard in Houma, Louisiana. The Magothy is 100’ long, with a 34’ beam, and a depth of 15’. Her gross tonnage is 99 tons. She is powered by two CAT3516, 2100 horse-power engines with Kort nozzles.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Oyster Creek, as seen on the same Working Harbor Committee Newark Bay tour, steaming along on the Kill Van Kull. Many of my photographer buddies abhor white tugs, decrying their lack of contrast with the sky and water, preferring the pigments and color ways of McAllister, Reinauer, and Moran tugs (all incorporate reds). Me, I like the challenge of getting the exposure right.
from vanebrothers.com
The Oyster Creek is a coastwise 3,000 horsepower towing vessel measuring 90’ long, 32’ wide, with a 13’ hull depth. Powered by two Caterpillar diesel engines, she is dedicated to 30,000-barrel tank barges. Her gross tonnage is 99 tons. The Oyster Creek is named for the Oyster Creek cove and tributary stream in Maryland.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Vane sent the Hunting Creek and Red Hook to compete in the 2013 Great North River Tugboat Race. Here they are just about crossing the finish line. Official results not handy at the time of this writing,
from vanebrothers.com
The Hunting Creek officially joined Vane’s ranks on February 3, 2012. Since then she has been a bunkering workhorse in New York Harbor. The sixth in a series of eight from Chesapeake Shipbuilding in Salisbury, Maryland, she is a 3,000 horsepower vessel, measuring 90′ long, 32′ wide, with a 13′ hull depth. She was designed by Frank Basile of Entech and Associates of Houma, Louisiana, and is named for the Hunting Creek cove and tributary stream in Maryland.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday- September 21, 2013
13 Steps Around Dutch Kills Walking Tour with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale now.
Saturday- September 28, 2013
Newtown Creek Boat Tour with the Working Harbor Committee- tickets on sale now.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
city noises
The tribute in lights, from the harbor.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Started off this week with a Working Harbor Committee trip on September the tenth, whereupon we observed the so called Tribute in Lights rising alongside the Freedom Tower (aka one World Trade) from the place of national remembrance and mourning. Here’s what I saw.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday- September 21, 2013
13 Steps Around Dutch Kills Walking Tour with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale now.
Saturday- September 28, 2013
Newtown Creek Boat Tour with the Working Harbor Committee- tickets on sale now.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
2013 Newtown Creek Boat Tour
The 2013 Newtown Creek Boat Tour.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On Saturday -the 28th of September- the Working Harbor Committee is producing and offering a boat tour of the Newtown Creek for any interested parties to attend. A special emphasis on the waterway’s storied history and maritime legacy will be made.
I’m going to be doing the history part, speaking in my capacity as the Newtown Creek Alliance Historian, and am tasked with highlighting the various points of interest encountered along the route. Anticipated to be some three hours in length, this boat tour will be delving some three miles inland, proceeding to the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge crossing English Kills in East Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Maritime History of Newtown Creek is one largely forgotten in these decadent times, but even now an odd tugboat and barge might be spied making their way down the waterway on any given day. Property owners were considered to have been blessed by some of the finest industrial bulkheads in the world a mere century ago, yet many of the businesses based along the Creek today ignore this invaluable resource, allowing their waterfront property to decay and decline.
Nevertheless, a staggering amount of maritime traffic is still observed here, and towing companies such as Reinauer, K-Sea, DonJon, and Poling and Cutler are regular visitors.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Vast operations will be witnessed by those onboard, many of which are involved in the scrap metal and recyclables trade. Responsible for an enormous amount of cross harbor shipping, companies such as SimsMetal are heavily reliant on the maritime trades for their economic success.
Not all that long ago, Newtown Creek carried a greater tonnage of cargo than the entire Mississippi River.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
An active and thriving industrial zone in the center of New York City, from the water one can truly grasp the sheer scale of Newtown Creek’s busy waterfront. Normally hidden by high fences and obscured by street facing structures, the intensity of the Newtown Creek is laid bare before the admiring gaze of first time visitor and veteran urban explorer alike.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A tributary of the estuarine East River, Newtown Creek extends some 3.8 miles from its junction with the more familiar waterway, and provides demarcation for the currently undefended border of much of Brooklyn and Queens. Named to the Federal Superfund list, the Creek suffers from a history of environmental degradation and municipal neglect.
An era of great change is upon the Newtown Creek, and this trip will be one of your last chances to see it in its current form.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
We will see four moveable bridges, and this year will be your last chance to see the static Kosciuszko Bridge which carries the BQE, as the NYS DOT has indicated that construction on its replacement will begin quite soon.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Along it’s banks, great fortunes have risen.
Amongst others- Peter Cooper (BO Railroad, Canton Iron, and Cooper Union), Charles Pratt (Astral Oil, and Pratt University), and ultimately John D. Rockefeller (Standard Oil)– all grew richer than the dreams of avarice in this place. Alongside them, the darkest mills of the industrial revolution- rendering plants, yeast distilleries, bone blackers, and acid factories provided tens of thousands of jobs to the immigrant populations of Brooklyn and Queens. Today- National Grid, BP, Amoco, ExxonMobil, and a host of other multinational companies still maintain an enormous investment in this valuable industrial canal.
Upcoming tour: Hidden Harbor Tours: Newtown Creek tour with Mitch Waxman.
Come explore Newtown Creek by boat with Working Harbor Executive Director Captain John Doswell and Newtown Creek Alliance Historian Mitch Waxman as your guides.
Boarding begins at 2:30 p.m., and departs at 3:00 p.m. sharp. The 2.5 hour, fully narrated, round-trip excursion departs from and returns to the New York Skyports Marina found at East 23rd Street & the FDR Drive in Manhattan.
There will be a cash bar onboard.
For inquiries about group discounts please call 212-757-1600.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
some assumption
If you smell something, say something.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Over the years, your humble narrator has presented glowing reports on the progress and practices of the NYC DEP at their titan Newtown Creek Waste Water Treatment plant found in Brooklyn’s DUGABO (Down Under the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge Onramp). Allusions have been made to one of the local community groups, the Newtown Creek Monitoring Committee, which has been waging a non stop dialogue with the agency for better than a decade.
This dialogue has played a critical role in shaping the construction process and procedures followed by DEP, and has created a venue wherein local concerns can be addressed and communicated directly to the otherwise opaque bureaucracy which typifies the governmental agencies of the City of Greater New York.
from nyc.gov
“The Newtown Creek Monitoring Committee is pleased with DEP’s progress at transforming the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant and adjacent waterfront into a Greenpoint destination,” said Irene Klementowicz, co-chair of the committee. “The plant continues to be an exciting model of the benefits of community-city collaboration, one that includes a shared vision of an aesthetic integration of the plant into the neighborhood. In a trend that started with the Nature Walk, the Visitor Center is the latest example of these efforts and one that will benefit residents citywide as it provides lessons about the importance of municipal infrastructure and environment. DEP’s commitment to continue to reduce odors and expand waterfront access and green space around the plant are further examples of our partnership efforts. The committee looks forward to continuing to work with DEP.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The DEP has taken a stance wherein they wish to minimize the impact that the gargantuan sewer plant has on surrounding neighborhoods, and NCMC has served as ombudsman and advocate for the affected. Accordingly, odor control systems such as those pictured above are an integral part of the plant. Problem is, these systems don’t always function correctly.
If you’ve found yourself walking or biking over the GPA Bridge when you suddenly experienced a withering blast of stink in the neighborhood of Greenpoint Avenue at Kingsland, you already know this.
from water-technology.net
With a rated capacity of 1.2 million cubic metres a day, this is New York City’s largest wastewater pump station and serves an area of 4,162 acres of land, fed by 180 miles of sewers. The upgrade programme involved increasing the station’s capacity to 1.5 million cubic metres a day and increasing the static lift necessary to match the higher hydraulic profile of the upgraded Newtown Creek plant.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The problem NCMC is concerned with (I’ve been attending their meetings as an observer for a few years now. Observer, as I live in Queens) is that the smells aren’t being reported to the 311 system by the affected residents of the surrounding neighborhoods. In the data driven climate of the Bloomberg era, an alien spacecraft landing in Central Park wouldn’t be responded to without some 311 activity, so according to the DEP- they’ve got the smells problem licked because of the lack of complaints.
Brooklynites failing to complain?
A humble narrator asks other Greenpoint bloggers to help spread the word to affected locals who might be wondering what that funky scent on the breeze is, and “if you smell something, say something” and call 311. It is the god given right of every New Yorker to complain to the Government until you’re blue in the face, which is far better than turning blue because of the smell of sewage.
from wikipedia
In New York City, 3-1-1 is used by city officials as one of several sources of measurement and information about the performance of city services. Important dates in the history of New York’s 3-1-1 service include December 20, 2005, when it received its record high of 240,000 calls, due to the first day of the 2005 New York City transit strike, and June 20, 2007, when it received its 50 millionth call.
The Newtown Pentacle 