Posts Tagged ‘photowalk’
rotarian path
Burnt, literally and figuratively.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A humble narrator feels a bit swollen in the brain today, a sensation which is coupled with a mild case of sunburn. Yesterday found me onboard a boat for the Waterfront Alliance’s annual conference, and one took advantage of the fantastic weather as much as possible by being out on deck after I had captured the photos which the WA asked me to get. Accordingly, my skinvelope is exhibiting the characteristic radiation burns one might expect after exposure to the emanations of the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As mentioned in earlier posts, a sudden flurry of activity has occurred in the last few weeks, which has been quite a distraction.
A recent event which I attended was here in Astoria – a visioning session conducted by the NYCEDC in pursuance of the BQX Street Car system as proposed by Mayor De Blasio – was actually quite interesting. I’m working on a fairly in depth series of posts exploring the idea, and next week I plan on walking the 16 mile route of the BQX to provide some sort of tangible visual documentation of the plan and route.
More on this one is coming.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Two events which I’m looking forward to will be occurring the weekend and week of the 21st – a walking tour of the Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek in Greenpoint with Atlas Obscura, and a boat tour of the Brooklyn waterfront with the Working Harbor Committee on the 26th.
Come with?
Upcoming Events and Tours
Saturday, May 21st at 3:30 p.m. –
A Return to The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek,
with Atlas Obscura, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Click here for more details.
Thursday, May 26th at 6 p.m. –
Brooklyn Waterfront: Past & Present Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
pertinent assertions
Cool Cars, Greenpoint edition.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Spotted a nifty set of wheels on Norman Avenue not long ago, which are attached to what I believe to be a 1949 Chrysler New Yorker. The body of the car wasn’t in the best shape, but then again, I hope I look this good and will still be street worthy when I’m sixty seven.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There was a giant engine under the hood in these old New Yorkers, a 323.5-cid straight eight. It’s a fairly huge car as well, with a nearly eleven foot long wheelbase.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The old thing had obviously seen many of her old parts replaced by makeshift specimens. There were quite a few bits of missing trim and other flare, but this car definitely looked drivable.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This car has a semi automatic transmission, which was a selling point. Cool dash as well.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The cross bar just below the license plate is engraved with “fluid drive,” which is what Chrysler branded the semi automatic transmission in the 1949 New Yorker as.
Upcoming Events and Tours
Saturday, May 21st at 3:30 p.m. –
A Return to The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek,
with Atlas Obscura, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Click here for more details.
Thursday, May 26th at 6 p.m. –
Brooklyn Waterfront: Past & Present Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
apportioned excess
At Brooklyn’s Unamed Canal, best described as a minor tributary of the Newtown Creek.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Whenever possible, on days when I’m conducting a walking tour somewhere around the fabulous Newtown Creek, I like to get there early and scout ahead. The Creeklands are full of surprises. If it’s one of the long ones, I’ll usually try and walk the route a day or two before the event, but for the shorter ones I like to “do it on the day.”
Last Sunday, we did a relatively short one revolving around Newtown Creek Alliance’s “North Henry Street Project.” The group encountered me and my pal Mai first, and I recounted the story of oil in Greenpoint, segued into the whole “CSO” or “combined sewer outfall” situation on the Creek, then talked about the sewer plant. At the end of Kingsland Avenue and what is theoretically North Henry Street, the group was handed over to my pal Will Elkins, NCA’s Project Manager and the fellow who is in charge of this whole North Henry Street situation.
Click here for NCA’s page describing the project.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
So, that’s why I was wandering around behind the sewer plant on Sunday morning at 9:30 in the morning. The first shot is from just three hours later, at the end of the tour when the weather had taken a dramatic turn for the better. It’s kind of lonely spot back here on Kingsland Avenue, although there’s actually quite a bit of activity – industrial wise – that happens back here.
Metro Fuel, Luna Lighting, Allocco Recycling, and a couple of others including the Department of Sanitation and the DEP are all buzzing around like busy little bees in this little cul de sac found in a part of Greenpoint which I refer to as DUGABO – Down Under the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge Onramp.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The star of the show in this section of the Newtown Creek heartlands is – of course – the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant and its stainless steel digester eggs. One of those digesters is going to be diverted from Municpal sewerage duty due to “Waste to Energy” project which the DEP has initiated with the National Grid company. Like a lot of “big green” projects, the devil is in the details with this thing.
The digester eggs are pretty incredible bits of technology, and purpose built. Within the eggs, the same micro organisms found within your own viscera are at work on an industrial scale. Said critters digest and sterilize the sewage sludge via biological processes. There’s a few byproducts to this process, one of which is a mephitic and combustible gas commonly called Methane.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Currently, the DEP uses some of this methane byproduct in pursuit of maintaining the temperature range required by the micro organisms within the digester eggs. The vast majority of it is burned off, however, making the plant an immense manufacturer of greenhouse gases. That’s where National Grid comes into the picture.
The National Grid people have partnered with DEP, and will be building a mechanism by which this excess Methane will be added to their own Methane Natural Gas network. Sounds great, right?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It seems that sewage doesn’t have the yield for viable commercial exploitation of the gas. Accordingly, one of the eggs is either now, or soon will be, offline for sewage duty, so it can be fed “food waste.” To guarantee that no pesticide or preservatives can addle the powers of the micro organisms, a preference has been stated for organic food waste. This organic waste is collected by trucks operated by the Department of Sanitation, which will converge from all over the City of Greater New York on Greenpoint’s hazy eastern border with Williamsburg and Bushwick. How do they know the food waste is organic? Let’s just say I know somebody in the school lunch lady Union that mentioned to me that their people were mandated to start separating food waste from the other trash recently. This mention was an angry one, as the City has provided no funds to facilitate the extra work.
The food waste will be “macerated” (chopped up), semi liquefied, and then pumped into another truck. That truck, which will be the sort of big tanker rigs you observe filling the underground tanks of gas stations, will then drive to the sewer plant and pump the stuff into the egg.
One year into the program, DEP and National Grid expect twelve of these tankers to be crossing through Greenpoint on a daily basis. They haven’t projected the number of truck trips through Greenpoint for the second year of the roll out yet. The “waste to energy” program, which seeks to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the amount of compostable organics headed to landfill, has inadvertently added hundreds if not thousands of heavy trucks a year to the already heavy flow of traffic through Greenpoint and the Creeklands as a whole.
Upcoming Events and Tours
Saturday, May 21st at 3:30 p.m. –
A Return to The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek,
with Atlas Obscura, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Click here for more details.
Thursday, May 26th at 6 p.m. –
Brooklyn Waterfront: Past & Present Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
imperfect posture
Just a short, and selfie, one today
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As one scuttles about from place to place, lots of things are observed. Recently, the young lady pictured above was taking advantage of a (fairly) recently installed bike lane on one of the truss bridges crossing the Sunnyside Yards, at 39th street, to capture a series of selfies as she rode along. Vision Zero, or zero vision?
Upcoming Events and Tours
Saturday, May 21st at 3:30 p.m. –
A Return to The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek,
with Atlas Obscura, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Click here for more details.
Thursday, May 26th at 6 p.m. –
Brooklyn Waterfront: Past & Present Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
that chafe
Catching up, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One has been on a tremendous “run” for the last couple of weeks, with several back to back walking tours of Newtown Creek thrown into the mix. Luckily, a slight window of opportunity to draw a breath is finally apparent, as I’ve only got three or four horribly important and time sensitive things to do this week.
The good news for me, and perhaps for you, is that I’m announcing two new excursions happening in the second half of May.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
DUKBO, or Down Under the Kosciuszko Bridge Onramp, in Greepoint has been off limits – tour wise – for a while due to the early phases of the Kosciuszko Bridge project. There was a lot of demolition, airborne nastiness, and several blocked or closed streets in this area which I’ve long referred to as “The Poison Cauldron,” and I haven’t felt it was advisable to bring anyone back there for health and safety reasons.
Whereas DUKBO is still a hellscape and littered with contaminants and filth… well, if you’ve got the stones… the Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek awaits you on May 21st.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On Thursday the 26th, I’ll be one of three speakers on the Working Harbor Committee’s Brooklyn Waterfront boat tour. We’ll be cruising the East River coast of Brooklyn from Newtown Creek to the Brooklyn Army Terminal, and I’ll be doing my “thang” with the history onboard. Also, since it’s an evening event – there should be some pretty good photographic opportunities as the sun will be setting while we’re out.
Upcoming Events and Tours
Saturday, May 21st at 3:30 p.m. –
A Return to The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek,
with Atlas Obscura, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Click here for more details.
Thursday, May 26th at 6 p.m. –
Brooklyn Waterfront: Past & Present Boat Tour,
with Working Harbor Committee. Click here for more details.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 