Day 1141

Today’s route — 13.8 miles

February 13th, 2015

Day 1141

Spiky butt blasters

February 13th, 2015



In other words, DON'T SIT HERE.

(Spotted in NoHo on the way to the Staten Island Ferry.)

Day 1141

Grant City

February 13th, 2015



on the Staten Island Railway

Day 1141

24 flags for 24 years

February 13th, 2015



A memorial to the life of Army Staff Sergeant Michael H. Ollis

Day 1141

9/11 memorial #228

February 13th, 2015



9-11 Flag Football League

Day 1141

9/11 memorial #229

February 13th, 2015



On 9/11, Stephen Siller, an off-duty firefighter, ran through the gridlocked Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel with some 60 pounds of gear on his back to reach ground zero, where he was killed. His namesake foundation organizes many fundraising events, including an annual 5k run through the tunnel to the World Trade Center.

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132 Bryant Avenue

February 13th, 2015


Day 1141

Snow on the tracks

February 13th, 2015



of the Staten Island Railway

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Portal of the day

February 13th, 2015



Troy Restaurant: "How many excuse do you need to eat great food? Correct: none."

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Gotcha!

February 13th, 2015



On the pole at right is one of NYC's relatively new speed cameras.

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Half Table Man

February 13th, 2015



Here at the home of this grassroots relief organization, there's some familiar-looking container-top signage on display, including the Hurricane Sandy memorial at left. (And speaking of container tops, check out the scene here back in 2013.)

Day 1141

’56 Chevy

February 13th, 2015


Day 1141

9/11 memorial #230

February 13th, 2015



Standing outside St. Margaret Mary Roman Catholic Church in Midland Beach, this monument commemorates the seven neighborhood residents who lost their lives on 9/11. The memorial also includes a cross made from World Trade Center steel and another stone dedicated to neighborhood rescue and recovery workers who died from 9/11-related causes. The only person currently listed on that stone is Firefighter Lawrence Sullivan.

Day 1141

Perfect for getting around town

February 13th, 2015


Day 1141

80 Edison Street

February 13th, 2015



A 2014 winner of the Preservation League of Staten Island's Appreciation and Stewardship award

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Bundled up for winter

February 13th, 2015



Padre Pio the stigmatic at St. Christopher's Roman Catholic Church

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Shrine of St. Christopher

February 13th, 2015



The patron saint of travelers at St. Christopher's Roman Catholic Church

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Better than the Old Dorp

February 13th, 2015



Seriously! From the 1679 journal of two Dutch travelers who were visiting Staten Island:

We went on to the little creek to sit down and rest ourselves there, and to cool our feet, and then proceeded to the houses which constituted the Oude Dorp [Old Village]. . . . There were seven houses, but only three in which any body lived. The others were abandoned, and their owners had gone to live on better places on the island, because the ground around this village was worn out and barren, and also too limited for their use. We went into the first house which was inhabited by English, and there rested ourselves and ate, and inquired further after the road. The woman was cross, and her husband not much better. We had to pay here for what we ate, which we had not done before. We paid three guilders in zeewan, although we only drank water. We proceeded by a tolerably good road to the Nieuwe Dorp [New Village] . . . We saw a house at a distance to which we directed ourselves across the bushes. It was the first house of the Nieuwe Dorp. We found there an Englishman who could speak Dutch, and who received us very cordially into his house, where we had as good as he and his wife had. She was a Dutch woman from the Manhatans, who was glad to have us in her house.

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10th Street

February 13th, 2015



While each of the other four boroughs is endowed with a vast profusion of numbered roadways, Staten Island can boast of only eleven such thoroughfares by my count (although there were once several more): 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th Streets here in New Dorp, and 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Courts in Annadale.

(If you look at a map of Staten Island, you may notice some numbered streets and avenues in the gated-off former tank farm area of Bloomfield [map] and on the old campus of the Willowbrook State School [map]. I'm not counting these roadways because they're not public streets and, as far as I know, they have no street signs indicating their names. You can also find a 19th Street in Annadale on Google Maps, but this block-long roadway is called Blue Heron Drive on its street sign and on the official city map as well.)

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Rose and Ross

February 13th, 2015



It seems unnecessarily confusing to give almost identical names to two consecutive parallel streets. Here's a similar situation we saw in the Bronx.

Day 1141

9/11 memorial #231

February 13th, 2015



The intersection of Husson Street and Jefferson Avenue was named Patricia A. Kuras 9/11 Memorial Way in honor of Ms. Kuras, who was killed on 9/11. There are many streets and intersections that have been named for 9/11 heroes and victims; for the purposes of enumerating 9/11 memorials, I'm considering them all to be part of a single citywide memorial. But the plaque above, mounted on a house a few blocks away from the aforementioned intersection, seems to be someone's individual creation, and so I'll count it as a separate memorial.

Day 1141

Who was Florence Rand?

February 13th, 2015



This plaque on a boulder in Last Chance Pond Park reads:

This site is preserved
in memory of
Florence Rand
who came to Staten Island
as a young teacher
and never forgot
the unique history
and beauty she discovered.

Day 1141

The Battery Wall

February 13th, 2015



After taking the Staten Island Ferry back to Manhattan, I entered the South Ferry subway station and passed by this reconstructed portion of an 18th-century stone wall that was discovered nearby in Battery Park, along with two other such walls, during the construction of the current South Ferry station in 2005-06.