Results tagged “weststreet”

While the Jane Hotel undergoes some "minor physical adjustments" after their loving neighbors had them temporarily shut down, Eater reports that other local establishments are picking up the slack. Here's a list of where to go in the neighborhood til the Jane reopens, but the Rusty Knot is actually hosting the hotel until further notice.

After Jersey City cop Martin Abreu was charged with vehicular manslaughter and driving while intoxicated, after allegedly striking two pedestrians—killing one and injuring the other—his mother defended him. The Daily News reports that a woman who identified herself as Abreu's mother said, "It was her fault," referring to 26-year-old Marilyn Feng, who died while crossing West Street at Albany in Battery Park City. The woman added, "So my son went out and had a couple of drinks. He deserves to have a good time now and then."

Well, this is a curious problem for FedEx's tracking system. How do you track your valuable packages when the truck carrying them has been stolen!?! A FedEx express truck was stopped on Manhattan's west side this morning by gun-wielding carjackers, who made off with the 18-wheeler. The driver was forced into a car and found in Brooklyn at around 1:30 a.m. A FedEx spokesman said the driver, who is not a suspect, was uninjured.

The Independent Budget Office released a report examining who might be affected by congestion pricing. The report, "Behind the Wheel: Who Drives Into The Proposed 'Congestion Zone'" can be read here (PDF) but the topline is that drivers are middle-class and over half are from Nassau County, Westchester, NJ, Connecticut and Pennsylvania. The report states, "Looking at the extremes of the earnings distribution for all congestion zone commuters, motor vehicle users were less likely...

The sewer main break that brought 15-20 feet of water to 90 West Street's basement garage now means its residents will be homeless for at least two weeks. Electricity and other utilities to the building were turned off and it was thought things would be fixed in 2-3 days, but building management told residents that the "central electrical distribution room" was so damaged that it needs to be "entirely replaced."

Yesterday morning's rain caused a recently installed sewer main to burst, flooding the basement and parking garage of a Battery Park City luxury apartment building. Water levels reached up to 20 feet. Not only were car owners greeted with news that their vehicles were either submerged or floating on top of sewer water, hundreds of tenants at 90 West Street were evacuated. Fire officials explained that, per WNBC, "rain flooded a re-routed sewer pipe,...

On December 1, 2006 around 9:30PM, 22-year-old Eric Ng was biking north on bike path by the West Side Highway. Around the same time, 27-year-old Eugene Cidron, leaving a party at Chelsea Piers in his BMW, mistook the bike path for the actual highway, drove south on the bike path and fatally struck Ng near West Street - at least a mile from Chelsea Piers. Ng was hit so hard that his bicycle and shoe...

When some Con Ed workers at Ground Zero found some human remains in a manhole last October, the city promised it would expand the search for remains (especially since it was revealed that the initial search for remains was more of a rush job). Now the city says that it will search under two more spots: West Street, in front of the World Financial Center, and Cedar Street, between Washington and West Streets.

We've heard of people taking up residence in commercial spaces all around the city, so hearing about NYU students living in an office space doesn't come as much of a surprise. The Times reports on some desperate measures being taken in order to live in this city.

In yet another sign that the state and city government want big business at the redeveloping area near the World Trade Center, the NY Times reports that JPMorgan Chase is "in negotiations...to build a 1.3 million-square foot skyscraper." And not only would thousands of employees move from Midtown (277 Park Ave.; the bank would keep 270 Park), the skyscraper would be at 130 Liberty St. - where the toxic Deutsche Building is being dismantled.

Chase wants a hefty incentive package, or subsidy, to build the 50-story tower on the site of the Deutsche Bank building, the officials said. The building would have to cantilever over a planned park along Liberty Street to accommodate large trading floors, and that could stir community opposition.

Continue reading "JP Morgan Chase May Head Near Ground Zero"

The city has announced that parts of West Street will be closed so searchers can look for remains from the World Trade Center attacks. Last October, Con Ed workers excavating a manhole found human remains, leading to renewed searches which have since yielded over 400 bone fragments.

It's on! This year's Idiotarod, sponsored by Carts of Brooklyn, started in Brooklyn, and the craziness was on. Our report from the field:

The controversial proposal to turn the UPS lot on Spring Street and West Street into a place for 106 Sanitation trucks may align Donald Trump with critics of his planned Trump Soho Hotel. The Donald takes a break from blabbing about ladies of The View and tells the Post, "I don't like trucks, the fumes, the traffic from the standpoint of the community... If the community wanted help, I would certainly help."

Radiator Tower, by Santi-Jose.

After over 200 hundred bone fragments have been found in recent searches for remains at the World Trade Center site, Mayor Bloomberg is expanding the search considerably. Here's the Mayor's press release about a report from the Despartment of Design and Construction:

Although the report finds that the vast majority of the site had been thoroughly searched and is free of human remains, it recommends the continued excavations on the haul road where remains have been recovered (the haul road runs parallel to West Street, from Vesey to Liberty Streets, along the western edge of the World Trade Center site); the exploratory excavation of the 140 Liberty Street parcel, the former site of the St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church; the searching of selected subterranean structures in neighboring streets, such as Con Edison, Verizon, and DEP manholes (at the Mayor's request, these searches will exceed the report's recommendations because all the material from these locations will be removed and sifted by OCME); and the development of protocols for future construction on the site which would include having the City's Medical Examiner on site to observe all future construction in areas that have not been excavated since 9/11. This work will continue to be coordinated with the Port Authority and no construction delays are anticipated as a result.

Continue reading "New Search for WTC Remains Planned"

ART OPENING: The Martinez Gallery presents an exhibition that "puts the artists behind the graffiti movement on display, challenging stereotypes about both the form and its practitioners. This collective self-portrait, which includes the work of twelve contemporary graffiti writers, exposes a history that the institutional art world and politicians, ignore and even censor." Featuring CASE 2, COCO 144, GIZ, JA, KEZ 5, LES, NATO, NOXER, RATE, SKUF, TRACY 168 and VFR. - Jason Laning

A cab carrying a group of friends early Sunday morning crashed into a building, causing one passenger to be thrown from the car and then fatally hit by an oncoming cab. The accident claimed the life of Danielle Ricco, who was sitting in the front passenger seat, as the cab headed south on the West Side Highway. The cab's other passengers claim the driver, Hassan Afzal, was trying to scare them by driving quickly, after they had complained about the loud music. Afzal lost control around West Houston Street, and ended up crashing into 340 West Street. That's when Ricco was thrown from the car, and another cab that was trying to avoid the crash ended up hitting her. Her friends say Ricco was actually trying to climb out of the car.

Seems the graffiti discussion we spotted in Williamsburg in March was just the tip of the iceberg. We spotted this door on West Street in Greenpoint yesterday, and it looks like it picks up where the last piece left off. Don't these people know about Williamsboard?

Joe wrote in to remind us that the massive Greenpoint Terminal Market was one month ago today. He also pointed out this massive gallery of GTM pictures from the intrepid explorers at LTVsquad . Related: lots of people have been taking pictures of the ruins and leftover piles of clothes on the GTM lot. We were down on West Street in Greenpoint yesterday, and the whole block was starting to stink of mold. Yum!

Yesterday we bicycled into Brooklyn with JCN to get some pictures of the rubble left over from the Greenpoint Terminal Market fire. The police still have a few blocks of West Street closed off, but a furniture store in one of the remaining buildings was open for a "fire sale." We walked into the store and out the back, and snapped a bunch of pictures of the ruins. You can see the whole set on Flickr-- but this panorama is the money shot (be sure to check it out large.). It's hard to describe the scale of the destruction, so we're not even going to try-- just take a look.

Insky on Flickr put up a nice shot of the ruins of the Greenpoint Terminal Fire-- you can check out the full set here. These are the first aftermath shots that really show the scope of the damage-- the landscape on West Street is radically different than it was at this time last week. [Related: the Post has a good article about the mechanics of fighting the fire-- apparently if the wind hadn't been blowing from the East, a chunk of Greenpoint would burned down. The Times also has a short piece explaining the alarm system that the FDNY uses.]

A five-alarm fire at the abandoned Greenpoint Terminal Warehouse/Market is being fought this morning in dramatic fashion: News choppers show that the FDNY's marine units are at work - the warehouse occupie a 200' by 600' lot along the East River. (WNBC's Vivian Lee, on location, said the fire was making it feel like a 100 degree day even 50 yards away.) Last year, Tien visited the terminal market last year and found a description of it from the Greenpoint-Williamsburg Environmental Impact Study:

The Greenpoint Terminal Market site occupies over three blocks of land along the East River between Greenpoint Avenue and Oak Street. This site, which is largely vacant, includes six industrial buildings ranging in height from one to seven stories, several of which are severely deteriorated. Immediately south of the Greenpoint Terminal Market is a now vacant piece of land formerly occupied by Consolidated Freight, a national freight forwarding company that declared bankruptcy in August 2002.

There's an interesting article in the Village Voice about downtown residents unhappy with all the Town Cars in the neighborhood. The cars wait for employees at investment banks and the like, and Community Board 1 passed a resolution forcing Goldman Sachs, which is building a new skyscraper on West Street, to "minimize the impact of black cars" to the area. An agreement was reached (GS will keep its cars in a garage until they are called for), though other firms don't necessarily keep their Town Cars from idling and blocking streets and causing pollution in the area, but this is what happens when you have big business and residential areas - you don't hear people complaining about town cars in Midtown, as they are part and parcel there, with law firms, publishing empires and ad agencies - as well as banks. But this makes us wonder if some competitor will introduce the unblack car - a fuel efficient hybrid, perhaps - to appeal to both firms and residents alike.

One of our favorite historians is Howard Zinn. Alongside our copy of A People's History of the United States is Zinn's play "Marx in Soho". The play portrays the return of Marx a century after his death. Stuck in an afterlife where intellectuals, artists, and radicals are sent (sounds awesome!) Marx is given permission to return to Soho London to have his say. A bureaucratic mix-up sends him to Soho in New York, where he discovers the joy of shoe shopping at Otto Tootsie Plohound. Psych!

The sad Jets host the disappointing Raiders, Sunday at 1 p.m. in East Rutherford. With former Giants QB Kerry Collins struggling, Oakland looks to start the physical Marques Tuiasosopo, who hasn't even taken a snap in game action this season.

The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation has posted an animated video of what the deconstruction of the Deutsche Bank at 130 Liberty Street will look like. It won't be demolished; rather, it will be carefully "detoxified and disassembled" because it is still extremely contaminated after September 11, 2001. The video is very cool (once you get past why it has to be deconstructed), showing that scaffolding will go up for crews to clean the building and that columns and windows will be carefully removed. There's even a simulation of the West Side Highway (or is it West Street), with cars speeding by as the building's floors are taken away.

There was a NY Times City section about the almost $30 million Houston Street construction project that will start this August and last for many, many years, from West Street to the Bowery. From the jawdropping scope of the project to the not-incidental project cost, Gothamist's first thought was "Wait, you mean the construction already on Houston isn't associated with this project?" Our second thought was, "No, not the part of Houston west of Broadway! It's so nice and quiet, relatively speaking!" As we read on, the city will be installing "new curbs, new traffic signals, new sidewalk space, new shrubbery, new sewers, new water mains, new everything" and many shop owners along Houston are unhappy, as they have already been living in construction hell. Translation: Walking along Houston Street will be noisy and dusty for years to come - and good luck trying to cross town in a cab. We tried to look for some more information, but all the Department of Design and Construction has on it is that it'll end in January 2008 (which will mean November 2008 if we're lucky). We stumbled on this interesting Department of Transportation page about protected streets, as in streets where construction cannot occur for five years because construction has already been completed; Houston is not listed here at all.

The U.S. Department of Transportation is giving New York and New Jersey $899 million for transit projects at the World Trade Center. The bulk of the money, $478 million, will go to an underground screening center that "would be the security conduit for all vehicles entering the ramps, roadways, loading docks and parking areas serving the new trade center buildings." Hey, that means 12 years after the first World Trade Center bombing, the government is finally coming around! The other money will go to rebuilding West Street, building the Santiago Calatrava-designed PATH terminal, and Fulton Street's underground pedestrian walkway.