Posts Tagged ‘Project FIrebox’
Project Firebox 5
Project Firebox, 1314 – photo by Mitch Waxman
Storied and replete with historical allegories and cautionary tales, Greenpoint in Brooklyn hosts some of New York’s most ancient street furniture. This survivor of the 20th century, I am told by certain reputable experts, would have had a lit globe at its summit when new. Said globe would light to indicate to arriving firefighters where the fire alarm was raised. This is on Provost street, near the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant.
As it turns out, Provost street is named for one of the original European settlers of Greenpoint:
from nyc-architecture.com
The Praa’s and Volchertsen’s, together, with the Mesorole’s, Calyer’s, Provoost’s, and Bennet’s formed the core of settler farmer families that lived and flourished on the land consisting of Green Point. They and their ancestors would do so for almost 200 years. The fertile land provided enough to supply the needs of the families that toiled on the land, and an abundant excess to trade at nearby markets. Each family kept a large row boat on the river to transport their harvest to the markets downstream in the emerging cities of Williamsburg and Brooklyn, and across the river in New York. Thus, Green Point became a major agricultural center and breadbasket for the area. It’s grains, cereals, fruits, vegetables and livestock made it possible for others to take up other trades in the New World, and contributed to the overall success of the pioneer efforts of that era.
Project Firebox 4
Project Firebox, 4430 – photo by Mitch Waxman
This curiously intact specimen, untrammeled despite its industrial location, was observed on the corner of 49th street and Astoria Blvd. near the witch crossed St. Michael’s cemetery.
from nydailynews.com
Mayor Bloomberg wants to extinguish fire alarm boxes from city streets.
Bloomberg pitched the fiery move this week as part of his budget for fiscal year 2011, saying it would save FDNY $2.5 million.
Since 85% of calls made through the street boxes are false alarms, Bloomberg said, “In the days where everybody has cell phones … the city would be just as safe without them.”
Only 140 structural fires last year out of 26,666 were first called in through an alarm box – and phone calls on those fires came in after the boxes were pulled, according to the FDNY.
But a change in the law is needed to scrap the 15,000 boxes because in 1997 a federal judge said such a move violates the civil rights of the deaf.
Project Firebox 3
Project Firebox, 6551 – photo by Mitch Waxman
Northern Blvd., battered and apparently out of order. Also, just as a note- the numbers assigned to the fireboxes have NOTHING to do with FDNY numerical assignations.
from forgotten-ny.com
A road runs from the East River to the tip of the North Fork of Long Island, running through Long Island City, Woodside, Jackson Heights, Flushing, Auburndale, Bayside, Douglaston, Little Neck, Great Neck, Munsey Park, Port Washington, Muttontown, East Norwich, Oyster Bay Cove, Cold Spring Harbor, Huntington, Northport, Smithtown, Stony Brook, St. James, Port Jefferson, Rocky Point, East Shoreham, Wading River, Calverton, Riverhead, Aquebogue, Jamesport, Mattituck, Cutchogue, Southold, Greenport, Orient and Orient Point, and would go further were an ocean not in the way. It is a precolonial trace used by Native Americans before Verrazano and the Dutchmen who followed him caught sight of the lengthy island along whose north shore it limns. It’s Jackson Avenue, North Hempstead Turnpike, Lawrence Hill Road, Fort Salonga Road, North Country Road, Main Road, Route 25A, Route 25, and in NYC and Nassau County, it’s Northern Boulevard.
Project Firebox 2
Project Firebox, 4930 – photo by Mitch Waxman
This battered sentinel is found on Skillman Avenue, just across the street from the cyclopean Sunnyside Yards.
from wikipedia
The yard is owned by Amtrak, but it is also used by New Jersey Transit. The shared tracks of the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) Main Line and Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor pass along the southern edge of the yard. Plans for the LIRR East Side Access project to build tracks to Grand Central Terminal would have those tracks diverging in the vicinity of, or perhaps through, the Sunnyside Yard.
Northeast of the yard a balloon track (or reverse loop) is used for “U-turning” Amtrak and NJ Transit trains which terminate at Penn Station. Leading eastward near the south side of the yard, this balloon track switches off and turns left under the LIRR/Amtrak tracks, turns left once again, and merges with the Sunnyside yard track to turn the train west toward Penn Station.
Project Firebox 1
Project Firebox, 2447 – photo by Mitch Waxman
Found in Maspeth, across the street from a string of late in the game Matthews Model Flats.
Whoops… I am told this is actually in Elmhurst, not Maspeth.
The Newtown Pentacle 