A tributary of Palmer's Run sees some daylight.
According to the AIA Guide to New York City, this is "Staten Island's most bizarre building: a manic combination of architecture and monumentally scaled sculpture." Here's a straight-on view from the front.
Supping al fresco at the Society of St. Paul Seminary
This Parks Department property, which was apparently acquired by the city when the Staten Island Expressway was built, consists of a single undeveloped (except for a garden in one corner), densely forested block hemmed in by houses and the aforementioned expressway.
In the days before Staten Island had access to city drinking water from upstate, businesses like the Crystal Water Company provided island well water to local residents. In fact, the property that contains the artesian well we visited all the way back on Day 1 once belonged to Crystal Water. I stopped by the well for a drink not too long ago, only to discover that the Marine Corps League, which now owns the property, has closed off public access. I went inside the League's bar to ask what happened; while two patrons glared at me in silence, my conversation with the bartender went something like this:
Me: Hey, how ya doin'? Is the well closed now?It didn't occur to me that a perpetual spring could be a source of much conflict, but apparently some people would get in arguments over having to wait excessive amounts of time while one person filled up multiple containers.
Bartender: [Long pause while he stares at me.] Yep.
Me: Because people were vandalizing it?
Bartender: People were fighting. Insurance company said we had to close it.
Me: Really? What were they fighting about?
Bartender: What do you think they were fighting about? Water.
It wasn't yet finished when I passed through Greenpoint last year, but the aptly named Transmitter Park is now open on the former site of the AM transmission towers for WNYC, the most listened-to public radio station in the country (and the one-time home of the short-lived "John Hour", in which Mayor Koch attempted to shame convicted customers of prostitutes by having their names read on air). Just watch out for dive-bombing mockingbirds!
We haven't seen one of these in quite a while. (Spotted while doing some unofficial walking in the East Village.)
This is the beginning of Prospect Park's totally man-made watercourse, which is mostly fed by a pipe, hidden behind the falls, that connects to the city's water supply system. (In the 19th century, the park's water came from a well; as we saw last year, the old wellhouse is still standing.)
to St. Vincent's Hospital, which closed in 2010. St. Vincent's played a major role in treating those injured on 9/11, and one of its walls was transformed into an impromptu community memorial to victims of the attacks.
(Spotted on an unofficial late-night stroll through Greenwich Village.)
a.k.a. the product display at Bell Fire Extinguisher Co.
on their way to Prospect Park from nearby Kensington Stables
This sculpture and its companion, presumably inspired by the monumental Roman Horse Tamers of antiquity, flank the Park Circle entrance to Prospect Park. According to the Parks Department: "The struggle between the frenzied horses and the nude youth was intended, as the sculpture's original title suggests, to illustrate 'The Triumph of Mind over Brute Force'."
Here are some photos from the much higher-profile version of this event at St. John the Divine.
The plaque reads, in part:
This park is at the location of the oldest existing milestone in New York City. The New Utrecht Milestone was placed here in approximately 1741 under the reign of George II. The stone, which served as a directional post to travelers, stood at the juncture of two colonial roads: Kings Highway and Old New Utrecht–Flatbush Road (now 18th Avenue). It also served as a gauge to determine postal rates.This property, long owned by the Van Pelts, was deeded to the city for one dollar in 1910 by a family descendant under the "express condition that the said premises be used and maintained as a site for exhibiting and preserving thereon a certain old Dutch milestone." The city has seemingly reneged on this deal, however: the milestone has been removed to the Brooklyn Historical Society. The Parks Department claims that a replica of the stone now stands in the park, but it was nowhere to be seen today.
Another hot spot of multicultural outdoor game-playing in Bensonhurst
This church was established in 1677, and its first church building was put up a few blocks away in 1700 using stones originally brought over as ship ballast from Holland. The current building, above, was constructed in 1828-29 using those same stones from the first church. Just out of frame to the right, still topped by the original eagle and weathervane, is the sixth incarnation of the liberty pole that was erected in 1783 to celebrate the withdrawal of British troops at the end of the Revolutionary War. (84th Street, at its intersection with 16th Avenue adjacent to the church grounds, has been co-named Liberty Pole Boulevard.)
Scott LoBaido's ubiquitous American flag murals have crossed the Narrows and are making some inroads here in Kings County.
At left is a southbound N train on the Sea Beach Line about to pass beneath 19th Avenue. At right, heading south on the northbound-side express (inner) track (as you can see, the express track on the southbound side is no longer usable here), are a bunch of empty new R188 cars, eventually destined to be used on the 7 train, that are likely on their way down to the Coney Island Complex. (It's not the first time such cars have been spotted in the area.)
The Sea Beach express tracks have not been used for regular passenger service in quite some time. All of the station platforms along the line are on the outside of the tracks, so an express train would have nowhere to stop to pick up and drop off riders. When the express tracks were used for passengers decades ago, they provided nonstop service between 59th Street (on the 4th Avenue Line) and the terminal station at Coney Island.
Behind this fence next to a ShopRite grocery store runs the Bay Ridge Branch, an old rail line whose right-of-way carries not only the occasional freight train, but also, as hinted by the signs on the gate, the Buckeye pipeline that transports jet fuel, gasoline, and heating oil to JFK Airport. As you may recall, this pipeline was a target of a highly overblown (here's why) terrorist plot back in 2007.
Staten Island Tea Party favorite Scott LoBaido decided to add some bite to one of his innumerable American flag murals (most are in Staten Island; this is the second we've seen in Brooklyn) after someone defaced it with the message "Patriotism Makes Me Sick", an act that LoBaido described as a "hate crime".
