I spotted this puzzling object on an unofficial walk today along Washington Avenue in Clinton Hill.
Day 665
Another sidewalk mystery
October 25th, 2013
I'm walking every street in New York City.
This is the counterpoint to my walk across the US. Instead of seeing a million places for just a minute each, I'm going to spend a million minutes exploring just one place. By the time I finish walking every block of every street in all five boroughs, I'll have traveled more than 8,000 miles on foot — all within a single city. Details!
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~9,954 miles walked
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That stone block was used during the era of horse drawn carriages. Those riding in a horse drawn carriage would step up/down to/from the carriage to/from the block then to/from the sidewalk.
That was my first thought as well, but the top of the stone is concave, which doesn’t make sense for a stepping stone. It also seems a little too tall to have been a stepping stone. Neither of those points rules out the possibility, of course, but they make me suspect it may have had some other use.
It looks like it could be a former horse trough, now filled in. See the article I wrote on a number of former troughs.
http://untappedcities.com/2012/07/10/remnants-of-when-horses-roamed-the-city/
I considered that too, but it seems too small to have been a trough, and it doesn’t look like anything has been filled in.
I think it’s concave because of wear…
But wouldn’t you expect the wear to be around the edges where people would have stepped, rather than in the middle?
Looking at the picture, it looks that it is made of the same concrete of the sidewalk. And the sidewalk looks relatively modern (maybe a few decades old, but I don’t think old enough to be someting related to horses)
Maybe it was the bas of something, like garbage cans or something.
Matt: What constitutes an “unofficial” walk? :-)
Maybe…someone had a tall vehicle — earliest SUV? — and they added it to get out of vehicle. Do not understand the curve though. Someone needs to take this photo to the City department Matt, to solve mystery. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it….