The bike rack in the foreground used to be a parking meter. Coin-fed meters (a.k.a. unofficial bike racks) have disappeared from the sidewalks of the city, replaced by multispace Muni-Meters, but some of the decapitated meter posts have been left in place and converted into official bike racks with the addition of a ring that riders can lock their bikes to.
Built around 1911, this is "thought to be the oldest synagogue in Queens". The congregation was originally Ashkenazi, but "in the late 1990s, a charismatic kosher butcher and rabbi from Central Asia moved to the area and slowly transformed the synagogue into the spiritual home of a community of impoverished Bukharan Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union." Here's an NY Times profile of that butcher-rabbi and his community (and here's a brief follow-up piece).
Antioch Baptist Church of Corona, formerly the Queensboro National Bank
Listo El Pollo, a former tiki bar transformed into "the Colombian Hooters", has apparently gone out of business.
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!
Email me at matt@imjustwalkin.com
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Maps: Progress | Photos
~9,954 miles walked
Your donations allow me to keep walking full-time. If you think what I'm doing is valuable and you'd like to offer some support, I would be very grateful. On the other hand, if you think I'm a worthless bum, feel free to email me and tell me to get a job, bozo. Both are excellent options!
