Subway sugar walls

 

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One Flushing cat caught, others escape

From PIX11:

A group of felines stuck behind a wall in Queens were able to find a way out — but now their whereabouts are a mystery.

The cats were stuck behind the 15 foot wall for three days, likely thirsty and hungry when PIX11 arrived on the scene last Thursday. After the story aired, city officials, and those with Animal Care Centers of NYC and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals tried to help the cats.

They put up a ladder to look over the wall, but were surprised to see no kittens. It seems the felines had escaped through a small hole at the back part of the ally.

One of the kittens was found roaming around where the ally once was, and was captured and treated, Carol Yao, a trained animal rescuer who works with organizations Kitty Kind and Angelico, said on Sunday.

Hopes are high they will locate the rest of the kittens on the building property.

Property owner traps kittens by building a wall

From PIX11:

The clock is ticking to rescue a group of cats trapped behind a brick wall in Queens.

They’ve been stuck for three days and are likely thirsty and hungry. Animal rescue groups and concerned residents are trying to save them; they reached out to PIX11 for help.

For months, the cats had been living in a narrow alley like area between an apartment building and garage on Northern Blvd. They’ve won the hearts of people in this neighborhood who stopped by to feed them.

A wall about 15 feet high was built on either end trapping the felines inside.They’re now out of sight - and their conditions unknown.

Sadly, the one cat that did escape before the wall went up now wanders on the other side and gazes up at the wall, trying to find a way to get back with his family.

[Carol] Yao says they have offered to pay for the cost to knock down a section of the wall.

Waste transfer station's wall collapse injures 2

From the Times Ledger:

The Fire Department filed a complaint with the city’s Department of Buildings against Royal Waste Services, a waste management facility in Jamaica, where a wall collapsed on two men Saturday, according to the FDNY.

The victims, age 34 and 40, were both taken to Jamaica Hospital after the incident, which occurred at 187-40 Hollis Ave., according to the NYPD. Both victims are expected to survive.

One patient was in critical condition and the other had a serious injury but was in stable condition, according to the FDNY.

The FDNY requested a structural stability inspection from the Department of Buildings later that day, a spokesman for FDNY said.

Two days later the Buildings Department put a partial vacate order on the facility, according to nyc.gov.

That's quite a firewall!

Sometimes you just pass a Queens Crap specimen that boggles your mind. I have to say that a wall like this is something I've never come across before.

This appears to have been a subdivision in order to build an "attached" two-family house.

The old house needs a lot of work, and the new one apparently still does as well.

MTA says they never promised to mitigate noise in Sunnyside

From PIX11:

They have heard enough.

Sunnyside residents are asking the MTA to add noise mitigation aspects to the East Side Access project bringing the LIRR into Grand Central.

“Yet again, the MTA has failed to keep its promises,” said NYC Council Majority Leader Jimmy Van Bramer who lives in the neighborhood and represents the district. “Given the engineering challenges the MTA has faced in the East Side Access project, it’s difficult to believe they can’t build a simple noise barrier.”

The big interlocking and connection point is in Sunnyside, Queens. The $10.8 billion project has faced cost overruns and delays. It's set to be done by the end of 2022.

The MTA says a sound wall was not promised.

The great walls of history

The Wailing Wall

The Great Wall

The Berlin Wall

The Wall of Astoria

Courtesy of George the Atheist

Warehouse wall erected on Steinway site

From George the Atheist

Tall walls don't always make good neighbors

From Crains:

What has angered many residents is the watchmaker's plan to expand the 160,000-square-foot plant by 50%. To do that, the company built a two-story extension that resulted in a 35-foot blank wall running along the back of the seven-acre lot. The howls of outrage came even though the privately held, 58-year-old watchmaker last year had voluntarily met with Queens officials to share its plans. At the time, the company, with its 350 skilled employees, seemed like an ideal fit for the area.

Surprised by the reaction, perhaps, but eager to please its new neighbors, E. Gluck quickly moved to make amends. In August, it spent more than $1 million to chop 14 feet off the offending 35-foot wall and set back the second story from the street by 40 feet.

"Our concern was to be a good neighbor," said Murray Stimler, senior vice president of the company, which imports parts from China and then crafts them into more than a half-dozen brand-name timepieces for Armitron, Nine West, Vince Camuto and Anne Klein, as well as private-label offerings.

He also noted that the company has put its security kiosk 50 feet back from the curb to spare locals from trucks idling in the street, and has splashed out $100,000 on mature trees and landscaping around the back of the plant. The hoops that E. Gluck has had to jump through in Little Neck come after 33 years as a pillar of the community in its current home, on the other side of Queens in Long Island City. There, ironically, E. Gluck is being forced out not by developers keen to convert its 800,000-square-foot, nine-story building into luxury condos, but by the City University of New York, which wants the property for its own use.

On the other hand, when it signed its 20-year lease in 2013, the city sweetened the deal by giving E. Gluck $15 million in tax incentives over 25 years. Now, after having spent a hunk of that savings to better fit into its new home, the company will move into it in December.

Shalimar Diner needs to clean up its act

"When you walk in Rego Park, make sure you're walking in the middle of the block as you pass the Shalimar Diner at 63-68 Austin Street.

Although the Shalimar has knowledge that they are responsible for keeping up the area around the curbside tree, they just ignore it. The grass is nearly waist high and the garbage strewn and hidden in the tall grass makes it a trip & fall waiting to happen.

If you walk too close to the building, you may get hit in the head by pieces of the cement facade that are falling off. Makes one think what is going on in their kitchen with all this obvious neglect!" - Anonymous

A less tall wall in Little Neck

From the Times Ledger:

Northeast Queens lawmakers announced Monday that the E. Gluck Corporation has agreed to modify a 36-foot gray wall that has become the source of dozens of complaints from Little Neck residents.

The wall was erected in April after construction began on the property, at 60-15 Little Neck Parkway, as the watchmaking company prepared to relocate from Long Island City to the new warehouse in northeast Queens. After several weeks of pressure from state and local representatives, E. Gluck has agreed to lower the wall, which faces 262nd Street, by 14 feet and will also add nearly 100 trees and plants to soften the look of the warehouse’s exterior.

Little Neck residents want wall to come down

From the Queens Chronicle:

The wall is up, the people are angry, and, according to state Sen. Tony Avella, “a stop work [order] is going into effect.”

At the center of the controversy is the construction of a new 35-foot-high building, which would sit atop a hill that is already approximately 10 feet above curb level, in the middle of a tree-lined residential neighborhood in Little Neck.

Nearly 100 area residents, along with Avella, Assemblyman Ed Braunstein (D-Bayside) and Councilman Mark Weprin (D-Oakland Gardens) and representatives of Community Board 11, gathered at the corner of 262nd Street and 60th Road on Tuesday morning to protest the construction.

“The moment I saw this, looking at the wall, I felt I was back in the concentration camp,” said a woman who identified herself only as Margret, a Holocaust survivor who lives on the corner across the street from the site. “It is very depressing. I sit at my table and I have to look at this wall.”

The wall, from most accounts, seemed to have been erected overnight.

This is County's pick for council member?

From the Queens Chronicle:

The race to replace outbound and embattled Councilman Dan Halloran (R-Whitestone) heated up Tuesday night at a forum held by the Auburndale Improvement Association at St. Kevin’s Church, as candidates tried to balance staying on message while answering a battery of specific questions presented by the civic.

The group devised a strict format for the evening, allotting 15 total minutes to every candidate. The first three minutes were dedicated to introductory statements. The remaining 12 were meant to address a list of questions handed to them ahead of time, covering topics such as overdevelopment, real estate taxes and the Federal Aviation Administration’s new and disruptive flight patterns to LaGuardia. There would then be three audience-submitted questions.

The rules dictated the candidates would speak on a first-come, first-serve basis. The race’s two Pauls — Graziano and Community Board 7 member and political scion Paul Vallone — arrived two minutes apart with Vallone coming in second.

A perturbed Vallone opened his remarks by noting Graziano refused to acquiesce his opening speaking slot despite the former’s prior commitments to his daughter’s soccer team, calling it an embodiment of some of his opponent’s character, without actually naming who he was talking about.

In some cases, blatant dodges or outright lies were spoken. When asked about the source of his contributions — specifically if any of them came from lobbyists or developers — Vallone launched into a big wet kiss for the Campaign Finance Board’s work, and voters’ ability to check out his campaign funding sources themselves.

In addition to the above, Vallone also referred to a local civic organization as "the damn Broadway-Flushing Homeowners" [at 1:54 on this video]. This ridiculous lapse in judgment speaks volumes about Mr. Vallone's character as well as the Queens County Democrats that chose him as their candidate.

He also embarrassingly chided the timekeeper when the timer went off at 3:10. He demanded equal time as the previous candidate (Graziano) who he claimed was up there "for about a half hour", but apparently was ignorant of the fact that the timer went off simply to let him know that he should wrap up his opening statement. (The truth be known, each candidate was given more than 15 minutes and just about the same amount of time, as the times on these videos show.)

And then at 10:35, listen to what Vallone says about the Dilluvio decision. The Dilluvio decision, in a nutshell, is about a homeowner in the Broadway-Flushing area who erected a wall on his property. Under Rickert-Finlay restrictive covenant rules, walls are not allowed in the front yard. The Broadway-Flushing Homeowners Association sued, the court ruled in their favor and Dilluvio appealed several times. The final appeal resulted in a win for Broadway-Flushing. The attorney representing Broadway-Flushing is former assemblyman Vincent Nicolosi, not Paul Vallone. So what does Vallone mean when he says, "We won"? He said himself that he is not currently a "damn" Broadway-Flushing homeowner, and he was not involved in the case. In fact, the candidate consulting for Broadway-Flushing on deed restriction cases is actually Paul Graziano. And Nicolosi donated to him.

And below is a photo of the Dilluvio home. See anything strange here?

Click photo for larger version

Maybe someone should tell the Dilluvios that the candidate they are publicly supporting is publicly expressing his happiness at their court loss. I bet they'll love that.

Well, Paul V. sure didn't say much about why he deserves to be a council member or what he would do to help the district during his time at Auburndale Improvement Association Candidates' Night. But we can always just visit his website to learn his positions on the important issues that have been brought to his attention. Astounding amount of info there.

Walls for Rockaway

From CBS New York:

Reinforcements are going up along a stretch of the Rockaways that was decimated by superstorm Sandy.

The storm barrier of more than 7,500 bags filled with 20,000 tons of sand will stretch from Beach 55th Street to Beach 149th Street when the dune construction project begins next month.

At the end of Beach 133rd Street in the Belle Harbor section of Far Rockaway, a four-foot concrete wall is already being built.

Steel wall for the A train

From WNYC:

It's official: New York is Holland now. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority is building a wall to keep out the sea along a two-mile stretch of the A line on its way to the Rockaways. The wall is made of thick steel and is rising seven feet above the tracks on the island of Broad Channel, in the middle of Jamaica Bay. The $38 million project is the MTA's first big step since Sandy to prevent flooding from future storm surges.

Rapid Repairs did more harm than good

From NBC:

A Staten Island family was devastated after a contractor hired by the city to make repairs in their Sandy-damaged home left a giant hole on the side of their house.

The contractor was hired by the city's Rapid Repairs program to fix a bathroom pipe and the heat in the home where Kathy Barzal lived with her husband and son in South Beach before Sandy left the home uninhabitable. The family has been living in a small apartment for the last four months.

Barzal said initially she was thrilled when the contractor showed up at the home Wednesday.

But Barzal's excitement was short-lived. The contractor did make the necessary repairs to the pipe, but in the process created a massive hole, approximately 8 feet wide and 3 feet tall, leaving the home exposed to the elements.

Walled in by apartment building in the Bronx

From CBS New York:

A Bronx family is up in arms over a four-story apartment building that is going up inches from their 1920s one-story brick cape on Bruckner Boulevard.

Patty Justiniano told 1010 WINS that the owner of the neighboring lots knocked on her door a year ago to explain his plan to build.

“He informed me he was building a lovely home for him and his mother and I was like, ‘Yeah right,’” Justiniano said.

“How do I replace that siding? How do I repair that siding? How do I clean my gutters?” Justiniano asked.

The new apartment building also blocks 10 windows on the side of her house.

“What do you do with them now? You don’t open them up because you’re looking at grey cinder blocks,” Justiniano said.

The Department of Buildings said the construction is within legal limits.

Justiniano admits that her home has a one-foot property line, but said the developer had two lots and could’ve moved at least a couple of feet away.

The city said the family can file a zoning challenge.

I'm surprised the City Council hasn't revised the buildings code to eliminate this type of thing. Oh, wait, that would hurt the bottom line of the developers to whom they are slaves.

Stop work order as revenge?

From Brownstoner's Astoria Renovation blog:

We had been warned by the seller, the former tenants and the other neighbors that the owner of the one house we share a party wall with was… difficult.

We tried to start things on the right foot with with all the neighbors, giving them an apologetic letter outlining the scope and schedule of the work and giving our and the contractor’s phone numbers for any problems. A few weeks into the work, we approached the afore-mentioned neighbor because we needed to dig a foot into her property to waterproof the walls of the extension, at a point where there was only an old cement patio.

She refused us access (even though legally we could have forced the issue). Well, we explained, we would need to come onto her property to apply the brick facing to the extension later in the project. She still refused.

Our neighbor would rather stare at an unfinished cement block wall than allow us onto her property to give a nice brick facing.

Then she suggested that if our contractor gave her a good price on some work she wanted done, she would let him have access. Well, the price — current Queens above-board building prices — was not what she — old Astorian mindset — was prepared to pay.

Then suddenly we got a visit from a DOB inspector because of a complaint. Our work was causing “cracks in a party wall.” Complaints are anonymous, but there is only one party wall — on the side with this neighbor. Most people, if they had cracking, would contact the owners or the builders, show them the problem, and demand to know how they were going to make it right. We have never heard anything from the neighbor directly, and no one has seen the claimed cracks.

Not hiding much

Wow, that's a great camouflage job. I can't believe there are cell towers behind those walls at 23-31 29th Street in Astoria... Completely fooled me.

Watch your walls

From NY1:

Those who think it's easy and legal to put up a wall in an apartment to create another room are urged by the city building commissioner to think again. NY1's Real Estate reporter Jill Urban filed the following report.

All the time, listings describe a unit as a “convertible” three-bedroom or a “Junior 4.” These terms imply that one can add a bedroom by simply putting up a wall. But most people do not know there is nothing simple about it.

"When the broker says, 'No big deal, just put up a wall and you’ll have a three-bedroom,' it sounds really great. But when you get into that position sometimes, it's not all what it’s cracked up to be," says Buildings Commissioner Robert LiMandri.

What the broker may not be sharing is that those temporary pressurized walls are illegal. Putting up a permanent wall requires a permit.

"What you want to make sure is that it is built according to codes. Codes are there to protect you, the people around you and the first responders. And when people don’t do the right thing, innocent people can get hurt," says LiMandri.

Getting a permit is a multi-step process. LiMandri says first a licensed architect or engineer needs to be hired to draw up the plans and file them with the city to get the permit. That can be time-consuming and pricey.