"Mr. or Ms Queens Crap,This urban blight is something that should absolutely disgust all folks.
It is becoming popular in many areas. The attached is from 213th and 73rd avenue in Bayside.
I called 311 but they said they can only act if a dangerous situation is present. I e-mailed the Office of City Councilman Weprin and they told me to call someone who told me to call someone who was never available.
Thanks."
- anonymous
22 comments:
Someone enlighten me please... what is the purpose of hanging your shoes above the street? Is it part of some (inferior) "culture" of someone who tries to turn Queens into a third world count(r)y... I hope the diversity police won't arrest me for stating that not all cultures are to be equally respected.
They indicate areas where drugs can be purchased.
This has been going on for decades! I remember seeing this in Middle Village from back in the 1970s. It is stupid and crass-looking, but if you want to make a cultural issue out of it then tell me who was doing it 30 years ago.
This shoe bligt has been around since I can remember. I hate it and don't understand it but now know what is symbolizes today via Crappy.
To combat this in the past I call all the utilities that are responsible for the lines. Verizon, RCN and Time Warner are those that maintain the lines on my block. Report that the lines are sagging very low and that tractor trailers are latching onto them about to be plulled down. They will come running to remove the shoes!
This has been going on since i was a boy growing up in Queens. IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH WHERE DRUGS CAN BE BOUGHT. I do not know the purpose but it is NOT drugs.
It's a VERY OLD tradition. I know in the old days, it was done at the end of the school year - when you got you new sneakers for the summer.
It's not new - heck, my Dad says it was done when he was a kid in the 1930s
You learn something new everyday.
Read this.
A lot of those shoes (sneakers) on the wires look like they are brand new. Whazzup with that?
Whoops wrong link.
Read this: Snopes
But yes, they do look ugly and should be taken down.
Back in the day.....
a bully grabbed some wimp's sneakers
in the schoolyard.....
and tossed them around for awhile
playing a taunting game
of "SALOOGIE" with them.
Eventually,
depending on his mood....
he either tossed them onto the phone lines
or returned them to their owner.
Today I'm sure this has a whole new meaning.
I had a similar experience in the 1970s with the city re a stripped, abandoned van that blocked access from the bottom of my alley to Dartmouth Street near Yellowstone.
Several neighbors and I tried to have it removed and were bounced back and forth between NYPD and Sanitation (inevitably, the last number you are referred to is the very first one you called).
I finally called the 112 and said I wished to report an explosion and a fire, which got their attention. I then explained about the van and how we local residents were going to pour gas on it...
It was removed in less than 1/2 hour. :-)
This is yet another example as how Queens is written off, and our politicians, instead of governing us, spend their time with developers (or love fest plaque ceremonies giving each other endless blocks of wood) while their communities rot around them.
Cable guys now string wires everywhere, dangling from roofs in front of buildings, every which way across fire escapes, secure that no one is going to stop them.
Poles lean on streets at dangerous angles and no one seems to care.
Kids throw shoes over lines and no one does anything about it.
Hell, if they don't do fundamental things like pick up garbage, no one cares about this stuff.
File under "Urban Legend..." Kids have been "retiring" sneakers for years. I did it myself in the 70's.
It' a bulling tactic that boy's use to torture the neighborhood nerd. When you see this it means that some poor kid walked home humiliated, and without his sneakers.
kg2v has it right. This is nothing new. I saw it in Cypress Hills, Brooklyn in the 50s and early 60s. Well before the drug culture. No one was selling drugs - there was no demand. It was widely understood that it was a last day of school thing. Me, I never had the luxury of throwaway shoes.
I will say that my daughter, now living in Astoria has heard this same drug myth.
The Snopes page did nothing to dispel the belief that shoes on a wire signify drugs. In fact, I know a kid I grew up with who knew what each type of shoe signified. Sneakers were one kind, lace up dress shoes were another; the color made a difference too.
* of drug I mean
I got one word for you- Skewville. Google it.
"This has been going on for decades! I remember seeing this in Middle Village from back in the 1970s. It is stupid and crass-looking, but if you want to make a cultural issue out of it then tell me who was doing it 30 years ago."
Probably mugsy. You can ask him at the next CB5 meeting.
RE burned out vans in the street...
You sure the city didn't PUT it there? It is/was a technique they would use for doing survailence/bugging. Want to catch that Mobster talking outside his place of business? That burned out van has mics and radios/recorders cached in it. Gee, we can talk here - it's just a burned out van... Until the investigation is done, it's not going anywhere
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