everydaytrash

It’s been an unseasonably warm fall in New York, which was perfect last Saturday for a tour of Newtown Creek—the industrial waterway that serves as part of the border between Brooklyn and Queens—with photographer (and Brooklyn native) Anthony Hamboussi who recently published a gorgeous book of photos also called Newtown Creek.

Newtown Creek the book

Tony was nice enough to revisit a lot of the vantage spots he frequented to create the book. We spent around five hours exploring different views of the creek and comparing the sites as they are now to some of the images preserved in his book. It was especially cool to see the huge shiny silver wastewater treatment plant “digester eggs” up close and in person and then flip backwards through the book to recall various points of their construction. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, I encourage you to visit the space between Brooklyn and Queens to see these massive metal eggs that separate sewage from water.

For me, a highlight was getting to see a barge up close. They’re huge!

Barge!

We also stopped to peep local graffiti art, like this metal welded piece by the legendary “Revs.” I love how this piece is structured so that the sun itself becomes the tag.

Fuckin Revs

In addition to the predictably industrial bits, we saw some naturally beautiful hidden bits of beach.

Pretty beach

And stumbled upon art in unexpected places.

Sculptures

All in all, it was a great day. I lost count of how many times we crossed from Brooklyn to Queens or Queens to Brooklyn. It was a lovely interborough adventure. I recommend checking it out for yourself. And whether or not you make the trek in person, I recommend checking out Newtown Creek the book. My five hour tour pales in comparison to the five years Tony spent photographing these in-between and unused spaces.  His next project is a study of “La petite ceinture,” the abandoned railway tracks that encircle Paris like “a little belt.” Now THERE’s a tour I’d like to take!

Thanks again, Tony!

Tags: Anthony Hamboussi, Brooklyn, La Petite Ceinture, Long Island City, Newtown Creek, Queens

This entry was posted on Monday, November 1, 2010 at 6:47 pm and is filed under Trash Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.