Posts Tagged ‘Pickman’
excitement and fatigue
In today’s post, what not to do on the Subway, a public service announcement.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
To start, I’d like to remind you that time well spent and the daily round for old Mitch normally includes trips to sewer plants, waste transfer stations, and hanging around a certain superfund site which defines the currently undefended border of Brooklyn and Queens. I can describe the different smells of residual sewage material versus that of putrescent garbage in some detail, and will often stop short and sniff at the air, proclaiming “there’s something dead nearby.” Saying that, the most disgusting thing I encounter on a daily basis is actually an electrified Petri dish we call the Subway.
from nytimes.com
The team identified no known human pathogens and found that about 5 percent of the microbial species (a fifth of those identifiable) probably came from human skin — our heels, heads and forearms, mostly.
“Every time you step down, you pressurize the air that’s in your shoe,” Dr. Pace said. “You stomp down, you squirt out a little warm air, carrying foot microbiology.” This so-called convective plume radiates from some 1.6 billion riders annually and disperses throughout the subway system.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’m sure that the system is cleaned as much as possible, and that the MTA folks do everything to the letter of the law. Theirs is a hopeless task, however, as the system is the focal point through which all of us must squeeze. We apes are a particularly disgusting lot, who often carry and consume foodstuffs down there, and riding along with us are the multitudinous pathogenic organisms which infect us. Urine, blood, and sputum adorn the platforms, and god itself only knows what might be festering in the rat blown darkness of the tunnels.
from nbcnews.com
Gerba found e-coli (a bacterium often responsible for food poisoning); MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, a staph infection that’s resistant to most first-line antibiotics); and fecal matter on handrails. Fecal matter is on 50 percent of all handrails (people, it’s time to seriously wash your hands after using the bathroom). It’s not uncommon for handrails to have flu, staph bacteria, and respiratory and cold viruses, as well. Previous research in England found that people are more likely to get a cold from handrails than any other public surfaces.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Sandals are, perhaps, the most illogical choice for footwear (IMHO) in the City of New York but I won’t go so far as to petition City Hall to ban them. My prejudice against this specie of shoe no doubt emanates from growing up in the glass strewn milieu of 1970’s Brooklyn, when smashing beer bottles against brick walls was all the rage. This fellow whom I noticed on the train recently, however, had apparently decided that even the open toed pseudo shoes were a bit too restraining for him. Folks, its bad enough we have to breathe the same air down there, exchanging our personal biomes via aerosol vectors, but… keep your damned shoes on when you’re riding the train. Bleh.
from myfoxny.com
Here are the numbers: in 2011, 46 track-cleaning positions were eliminated saving the MTA $3.9 million; 11 escalator cleaning positions were cut, saving $1 million; and 116 car cleaner positions got the ax, saving the agency $8.6 million.
Happy Labor Day
It took a whole lot of labor to build this thing.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Don’t get sunburned, eat too much, or too drunk today. I got all those things out of the way yesterday, during and after the Tugboat Race on the Hudson.
Project Firebox 86
An ongoing catalog of New York’s endangered Fireboxes.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This municipal button has style, verve, and swagger. It towers precipitously on Crescent Street at the border of Astoria and Dutch Kills (the neighborhood, not the waterway, baby) awaiting the emergent and quite uncool news that trouble has arrived. Always at the ready to raise the roof or the alarum, this party loving firebox lets all that pass know help is just one shake of the lever away.
Things to do!
Working Harbor Committee presents: Great North River Tugboat Races and Competition, September 1st, 2013
9:30-11:30 a.m. at West 42nd Street and the Hudson River. Spectator Boat tickets now on sale.
grinning androsphynxes
In today’s post… Staten Island…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A rock thrust roughly from the sea, named for the parliamentary body of the 17th century incarnation of the nation of Holland, …Staten Island… is a place which I’ve been developing a real interest in of late. I will admit that the connections between the Kriescher and Steinway families discussed in this Newtown Pentacle post from May of 2010 spurred my curiosity, but I haven’t strayed too far from the Northern Coast of the island.
An abundance of my posts about Staten Island seem to start and end with a tugboat, but there is a lot going on out here in the deep south which one hopes to explore in the near future.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Intentions to move a bit farther out on… Staten Island… unfortunately involves the use of MTA buses due to the vast size and distances offered by the place. This introduces an distinct kink in my usual plan, which is wander around and find stuff, but for those of you who haven’t walked around the the borough, it offers steep hills and an unforgiving number of cul de sacs which branch off the main roads.
One could easily find himself isolated and surrounded by angry old women armed with brooms or shovels.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Still, there are some real treasures buried in the wooded hills on Staten Island. This little number was introduced to me by Kevin Walsh from Forgotten-NY a couple of years ago, a storybook house set on a hill from which one can see tugboats passing by on the Kill Van Kull.
Things to do!
Working Harbor Committee presents: Great North River Tugboat Races and Competition, September 1st, 2013
9:30-11:30 a.m. at West 42nd Street and the Hudson River. Spectator Boat tickets now on sale.
studied record
In today’s post- infinite Brooklyn.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The sheer size of Brooklyn, geographically speaking, is staggering. When one takes into account all of the former various environments contained within the borough, whether former wetlands or forested hills, the mind reels. You can still tell what used to be what in the ancient city, Canarsie is always a bit more humid than Park Slope and Greenpoint a bit more prone to flooding than Bushwick.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Its da land a me boit, Brooklyns. Ise growns ups around dere, out in Canossy near da flatlands, buts Ise nevers gets back dere toos awfun. Nuttin much left from da old days, all my friends and families, dey done moved on and odder dan a pizza joint or two de old neighborhood ain’t mine no more, if it evah was. Dats Brooklyn for ya.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
These days, one rather enjoys the view of the place from outside, on the water. The littoral edge of Brooklyn has always been locked up in the hands of private business and government concerns, and is as such, an interesting historical canvas. Artifacts of New York’s industrial beginnings, relict creeks and streams, the true purpose and history of Canarsie Pier… Brooklyn is infinite…
Still, its no Queens.
Things to do!
Working Harbor Committee presents: Great North River Tugboat Races and Competition, September 1st, 2013
9:30-11:30 a.m. at West 42nd Street and the Hudson River. Spectator Boat tickets now on sale.
