Newtown Creek (The City Concealed)
Thirteen.org’s “The City Concealed” has a brief tour and history of Newtown Creek. Could be worth a couple of minutes. My favorite quote:
“The hard bottom is 35′. The soft bottom is 20′. That’s 15′ of mayonaisse with everything that’s ever been put in there.”
But why is it that the only thing activists think to do with the waterfront is housing? Certainly, as the Bernard Ente of the Newtown Creek Alliance in the video says, “People like to live next to water.” But there are so many other activites that benefit from proximity to water. That’s why all the factories moved there to begin with. Why not make the area a depot for a water-borne sanitation system? Or perhaps provide a home for the automotive repair, printing services, and other light manufacturing that is getting pushed out of other parts of the city with freight ferries to carry the products to their destinations?
You apparently have not learned the First Commandment of the Gospel according to Community Activists:
“Thou shalt not question Affordable Housing.”
It is The Answer to everything. Isn’t it self-evident?
Here’s some examples:
Q.
What could we do with the industrial area around the Sheridan Expressway?
A.
Destroy the shops and add low income housing for people (would be then be) without jobs.
Q.
What should we put at the terminus of a high capacity transit system from New Jersey at the World Trade Center?
A.
Affordable housing for people who would never take the train to or from New Jersey. What’s a few billion dollars for a handful of new affordable dwellings?
Q.
There are traffic and environmental impacts from trucks in the neighborhoods surrounding Hunts Point. What can we do to improve the living conditions for the people in these neighborhoods?
A.
Let’s add more affordable housing. Then we can complain about Environmental Justice because the trucks are only impacting poor people. If we complain enough, maybe the trucks will stop coming.
See? Now why didn’t you get that?