Weekend dumping, hysteria, looking a dealer/pimp(?) in the eye...

This is what is so depressing and frustrating and discouraging: yesterday afternoon I spent a good 2 hours picking up each and every scrap of garbage and debris from 43rd Avenue, every little parking receipt and crumpled tissue that I could find. By around 4:30pm I was exhausted, but the Avenue was spotless (between 72nd and 74th Streets at least). I went home satisfied, only to come out a couple hours later to find this:

 

 

Dec. 28, 2014 pile on 43rd Ave.
 

Box in the Dec 28 pile. Return address is B&N. Looks like the idiot who dumped this pile was
smart enough to remove his or her own name at least...

This seems like the only potential clue to the dumper's identity, if it was his or her own box and not just a box he found in the basement or on the street. I googled ODON DORON, 1536 (building number?) and 4E (apt #?), in various combinations, but I did not find anything useful.

Dug through some papers in the pile, but again, did not find anything that seemed useful in identifying the person. I thought perhaps the name in this confessional (?) note would be useful: looks like "Aaliyah R. Kelly"- but that is the name of the beautiful young singer who died tragically in a plane crash in the year 2001. So, I don't think she is our dumper. I don't even think R. Kelly is our dumper. Sure there were some dapper menswear boxes in the pile, but, I dunno, if you're rich and famous, surely you could hire someone who is smart enough to dispose of your personal items properly.

Personnel Concepts is a company that supplies OSHA and other
Employee Safety posters to companies. Police Corporation is the name of
some douchey-looking designer menswear company (from what I could find online).
Our dumper sure has fancy taste (see also the Fifth Avenue hat store box photo above).



 

And here of course we have yet another 43rd Avenue Whitefish. The one in the photo is the fourth that I saw just yesterday (Dec. 28) on 43rd. Oh, and while I was freaking out over the dump pile and yelling and crying like a lunatic, there was a car parked nearby that had a couple who looked like they were pretty, er, active in the backseat. I didn't exactly pause to look, and honestly I was too irate over this dump-pile to give a crap about people forking on the Avenue. But when I saw this 4th condom, after my hours of cleanup that resulted in nothing more than a f*ck-you-dump-pile, I just about gave up all hope. I mean, understand: I had already picked up 1, 2, 3 used condoms that same day from the same block.

I think I met the pimp who was waiting for the transaction in the car to wind down. When I spotted the dump pile from my corner, I stormed toward it furiously, but even in that state I noticed a guy hanging out by the overpass. He was just standing there playing a game on his phone (or so I surmised from the beeping/zinging noises the phone was emitting). The guy was about 15 feet from the parked car with the f*cking couple (and the parked car was pretty much right in front of the dump pile). So I was crying and cursing like a crazy lady, and taking flash photos of the pile, and using my phone flashlight (which is actually pretty powerful) while I was digging through the boxes frantically trying to find a name and address (don't know why though; when someone actually dumped boxes with his name and address on it and I reported it to 311, the operator said that there was nothing she could do with the info). After a few minutes of me looking/acting like a lunatic, and probably causing too much of a ruckus too close to the f*ckmobile, the guy came over to me and said, in a really annoyed kind of tone, "What are you looking for?" I turned to him and I swear I was crying, I mean, I was SO hurt and frustrated at that point that I didn't even care if he was a pimp, or a dealer who was protecting his turf and about to blow my head off, and I just said "I'm looking for an address of the person who did this! I just cleaned this entire block, and look what someone did!!" I must have sounded so hysterical that he just sort of rolled his eyes and went back to his post. The people in the car never even seemed to notice my presence (if they did, it certainly did not interfere with their activity, from the moving shapes/shadows I could see in the darkened car window).

Yeah, so it was a holiday weekend full of prostitution (or at least blatant street f*cking) and dumping, and a seemingly wasted 2 hours of my life.


UPDATE: 12:32pm: My hubby called to inform me that the garbage was picked up already! (I had called this in to 311 last night.) YAY!!!!!!!!!!THANK YOU THANK YOU DSNY!!!!

43rd Ave Real Estate Update

UPDATE: As of Dec 28, Awesome John C. (AKA, Fire Alarm Guy) removed the graffiti from the windows, and someone else (the owner??) removed some of the graffiti from the side of the building. YAY!!!

 

 

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A couple months ago I wrote about a vacant building on 43rd Avenue. It was constructed several years ago. It went up in record time (I hadn't known a building could be brought into being so quickly). But then I guess the owner ran into problems- financial or permit issues, who knows- and construction came to a halt as quickly as it had begun. For the next couple of years this majestic edifice was "protected" by a few planks of collapsing, rotting, and graffitied upon plywood and a mote of garbage. After several neighbors called in complaints to 311, someone (the owner?) finally took down the pathetic construction fence, removed the garbage, and cut the weeds. Then at least it looked much better. But now I fear that it looks TOO good, at least to local young(ish) people who see it as a nifty hangout spot. They have marked their territory with some illegible scribbling on the back door, the stairwells (including the marble), a side window, and the walls. Yesterday I went down both stairwells (there's one in front and back) to pick up trash. As expected, there were many used condoms and drug baggies. There was plenty of other crap as well, including booze bottles, a hairbrush, a baby bottle(?!), a pair of eyeglasses, and a carpet of ciggy butts.

 

I don't know what to do. I guess we can't paint over most of the graffiti (just the back door, which requires some simple white paint). Can graffiti be scrubbed off bricks? Or marble? It's so pathetic that these losers even tagged the marble. Really, what in the fork is wrong with people? How ugly do they want their environment (and, by extension, life) to be?

 

At least the doors are locked now. Of course, this could just mean that the people living inside like to keep their "home" safe from intruders.

 

 

 

December 19,2014 Dumping 💩

Update: I called 311 the night I saw this crap (Friday, Dec. 19). It was gone by the following morning. Thank you as always, DSNY!!

Holiday decor: seasonal tree skirt and medical waste!

The previous post included a photo of a blue mop head in the filthy gutter in front of a business near the Roosevelt Avenue stop. Unbelievably, this mop head was still present as of this morning. I lost count of how many weeks it has been there.

12/15/14. Mop head in the gutter in front of a local business.
 

Additionally, a mop head now decorates the base of a nearby tree. I don't know if this is one of the mop heads from the gutter that somehow ended up back on the sidewalk, or a brand new one for the holiday season. I guess it does make a good tree skirt. And presents are certainly piling up underneath (if you consider cigarette butts and bottle caps presents).

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Meanwhile, the medical office next door contributed its own decorations to the sidewalk in the form of what appears to be a dirty chuck or drape, and a pair of exam gloves in the gutter.

 

12/15/14. Sidewalk in front of a medical office.

12/15/14: Close-up of litter in front of the medical office.



12/15/14: Exam glove (?) in gutter in front of medical office....
though honestly I find these all over the neighborhood,
so maybe it didn't even come from a medical facility.

 

I'll give this medical office the benefit of the doubt and assume that a garbage bag ripped at night (raccoons/possums/cats?), debris blew out onto the sidewalk, and when the employees come in this morning they will clean it up right away. If this is still there tonight, I am going to be pissed (and majorly skeeved). A kindly commenter to my last post suggested I make the names of these businesses public on yelp, but so far I've been too chicken to do so. In my mind I justified my chicken-hood by  saying "Well, maybe these businesses actually are clean inside, and just are too busy to deal with  their gutters." But honestly, the medical-waste-on-the-sidewalk and month-plus presence of guttermops are giving me second thoughts.

 

UPDATE December 22, 2014: I have disposed of these two mopheads!! That's right, for the first time in weeks, there are no blue mopheads in the gutter in front of a certain "medical" office on 74th!! At least, there weren't any as of 8:30 this morning... maybe they've been replaced with new ones though, or some other new form of nastiness. Yeah, I felt so relieved getting that second mophead this morning on the way to work. I picked up the first one yesterday afternoon, when I made an intentional OGCLE cleaning trip all the way down 74th Street to Roosevelt (usually I stop at Woodside Ave, but these mopheads were nagging at me). I was only able to pick up one yesterday because the other was under the tire of a parked car (believe me, I did give it a good tug, but it wouldn't budge). I wasn't really planning to collect the 2nd one this morning, but when I walked by, I saw it just lying there (no car parked over it) and I could not pass up the opportunity. So I grabbed a couple of plastic bags (there are always a few plastic bags kicking around), picked it up, and deposited it in the corner trash can. Thus ends my month-long saga. The white whale has been speared! (rather, bagged and deposited in the proper receptacle). Oh yeah, a lady saw me pick up this filthy and dripping mophead, and when I walked by her on the way to the trash can she stopped and stared at me in what looked like disgust and horror and uttered "J_ Christ!"

Dining at Chateau Guttermop tonight?

Below are photos of the gutters that I pass every morning on my way to the train. These gutters are NOT on 43rd Avenue; they are actually in front of two very hopping businesses.

 

Would you seek medical care in a doctor's office that looks like this out front?

 (Ya think Infection Control is high on their list of priorities? I'm guessing not.)

The two blue mop heads at the top of this photo

have been here for at least 3 weeks (that's when

I first noticed them at least). The street

sweeper rolls right over them, and it never occurs to the

business owner(s) to pick them up.

Would you dine in a restaurant that looks like this out front?

(Seriously, what do you think their kitchen looks like?)

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I started this blog with the intention of documenting only the filth of 43rd Avenue. But once I rolled up my sleeves and started picking up garbage,* I became more aware of nastiness in other parts of the neighborhood. I have been passing sights like this for years, and I guess I just subconsciously forced myself to ignore them. But now, unfortunately, I cannot help but see them.

 

*I don't really roll up my sleeves when I go out on a trash pick-up. Believe me, I do not want to risk skin contact with some of the things I find on the streets and sidewalks round these parts!

 

Maybe the stretch of 43rd between 72nd and 74th Street is more susceptible to filthy conditions because a large part of it is made up of the railroad overpass, so no one is legally (as a homeowner would be) responsible for keeping the sidewalk and gutter clean. But the photographs above were taken in front of businesses. Moreover, they are the types of businesses that you really would want to have higher standards of cleanliness: a restaurant and a medical office.

 

Perhaps the owners of these businesses think that the city is responsible for anything beyond the sidewalk. Even if that were true (and from what I understand of the DSNY regs, pasted below, it is not), wouldn't it be in the business owner's interest to keep their gutters at least relatively clean? I think the only reason that business owners ignore crap like this is because their customers ignore it. This is what bothers me so much: maybe the people who patronize these businesses have just become so inured to the presence of filth/trash/dumping/general nastiness that that they no longer register it in their conscious minds. How can I open peoples' eyes and make them see that life does not have to be this ugly, and that they deserve better? Maybe I should bring my cart down to these gutters and do a trash pick-up.....perhaps when business owners see some random person cleaning their property they will be shamed into taking care of their own gutters! (I doubt it, but I can't think of anything else.) 

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For what it's worth: I looked up the city regulations about sidewalks and gutters, and from what I understand of this paragraph below, merchants/business/stores are responsible for gutter areas 18 inches from their curb.

 

From the DSNY Rules and Regulations: Except where specifically noted, the following laws are applicable to all residents, merchants, businesses, stores, restaurants, and commercial and residential premises....The sidewalks (including areas like tree pits, grass strips, etc.) and gutter areas (18 inches from the curb into the street) along the building perimeter must be kept clean. Sweepings must be picked up and deposited in suitable containers for collection. Sanitation litter baskets may not be used for this purpose.

It's garbage night! (rather, illegal dumping night!)

I apologize for the lousy quality photos, but they were taken at night with a cell phone camera. Thanks to the DSNY, these items were gone when I went by this morning-- they must have picked them up the same night I called in the complaint to 311; thank you DSNY!!

 

We hadn't experienced dumping on 43rd Avenue in weeks. I optimistically/stupidly thought that perhaps my obsessive litter-collecting, and the Woodside Neighborhood Association's wonderful work here last month, sent the message to would-be miscreants that this block is no longer being ignored and that residents will not tolerate dumping, litter, and graffiti. Well, my stroll down 43rd last night was a slap in the face times three: there was plenty of litter (despite the fact that I had picked up every piece of litter on both Saturday and Sunday), and also dumping and graffiti. Great.

311 Complaint called in 11/24/14 circa 8:30pm: 201-ML-MA-06385; picked up by early the next morning (thank you DSNY!!).

11/24/14: mattress dumped on 43rd Avenue



11/24/14: small pile of hymnals dumped on 43rd Avenue

11/24/14: close-up of a hymnal



 



11/24/14: pile of VHS tapes dumped on 43rd Avenue
(blank tapes that were used to record shows from TV, eg, "1988 Olympics"--
but who really knows what was on these tapes?)
 



11/24/14: The neater stack of the VHS collection
 that some kind soul donated to the sidewalk of 43rd Avenue.
Thanks!

 

No Trashcan For You!

 

 



How do you break a garbage can?
For whatever reason,
 this subway can was taken out of service.

Yesterday I was asked why I think litter/general filth is such a big problem in this area. The short answer is: there's a whole lotta people and not enough public trash receptacles. Anyone exiting the Roosevelt Avenue station can see that this is a very densely populated area. Besides the people who actually live here, this area also has many folks passing through at all hours of the day and night. The Roosevelt Avenue train station is a major transfer hub for people traveling to and from JFK and LaGuardia. In addition, there is a huge city hospital just a few blocks away. And of course there are some well known bars and restaurants along Roosevelt and Woodside that attract people from other neighborhoods and boroughs (don't get me started on the omnipresent line of hipsters outside Ayada; if you find an empty pack of yellow American Spirits, it was probably dropped by one of them...just kidding...well, not really). So yeah, there are a lot of people here. And people produce trash. And we need a place to dispose of this trash.

 

Why then are there hardly any public trash cans??

 

I believe there are a couple cans along Roosevelt Avenue right near the train exits. But we need a can on every corner of Roosevelt, Broadway, and Woodside Avenues.

 

Someone told me that the city took away many of the public trash cans because people kept using them for household trash disposal. I guess the oh-so-brilliant people who control can distribution figured that if they took away public garbage receptacles, people would realize the error of their ways, stop taking advantage of the public garbage cans, and, uh, wave a magic wand to make their excess trash disappear-? I know it's a burden on the city to have to clean up after people who dump their household trash in public cans, but taking away the cans doesn't stop this practice. Obviously folks still dispose of their garbage improperly, only instead of in cans, they leave it right on the sidewalks and streets and on seemingly deserted stretches of land like 43rd Avenue.

Taking away public garbage cans does nothing to deter inappropriate disposal of household trash; all it does is punish the people who live/work/pass through the neighborhood by forcing us to endure filthy conditions.

 

Please, New York City, please please please with sugar (or that white powder in the drug baggie that I found on 43rd Ave this morning) on top: Please bring back public trash cans!!! We in Elmhurst and Woodside pay taxes too, just like those fancy people in Manhattan and Brooklyn who have a plethora of public garbage cans. We don't deserve to live in squalor. Please stop punishing an entire neighborhood because of the errors (ie, improper trash disposal) of a few.

 

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Last week I wrote about the stupidity of having 2 recycling bins but no (or one small and overflowing) garbage can in front of the Queens Center Mall. This past weekend, I saw that someone had taken it upon him- or herself to provide the public with a trash container. T'was in the form of a broken plastic crate, but people recognized it as an adequate trash receptacle and proceeded to throw their trash in (or in the general vicinity of) it. So thank you, oh kind neighbor/illegal-dumper! (Hey, at the risk of sounding selfish, I'm just relieved that this plastic crate didn't end up on 43rd so I don't have to deal with it myself.)

 

 

UPDATE: Friday morn (11/14/14). This morning I saw a couple of Doe Fund workers picking up litter near Roosevelt and 74th Street!! Woohoo!! Thanks Danny D (or whoever arranged for this service). And thank you to the men and women of the Doe Fund who got stuck in this neighborhood. I know that Roosevelt and 74th offers a gross amount and variety of street debris. On behalf of my neighbors and myself, thank you- your work is very very very much appreciated!


UPDATE #2 (11/19/14). I passed this pan-in-a-can in Manhattan, and I immediately thought of this blog post. To the person who decides whether residents are worthy of having trash cans in their busy commercial areas: So there are hardly any trash cans on uber-busy Roosevelt and Woodside Avenues because we use them to dispose of our household trash? Well, at the risk of sounding as puerile as you think I am, I ask, **"How come Manhattanites get to throw out household trash in city cans and still get a can on nearly every corner?! It's not fair!!" [**read this to yourself in the most high-pitched whiney voice possible, with stamping-foot accompaniment]



Upper East Side of Manhattan

Police release sketch of man whose body was found in the 43rd Avenue lot

I was very happy to finally find an update to the case of the person whose body parts were found in bags in the 43rd Avenue lot* back in April. Brief background: a homeless man collecting cans in the area found a bag with body parts; he called the 5-0, who subsequently found a few more bags. (*I'm actually not sure if the bags were found in the lot itself or along the tracks that border it, or both; all I know is when the discovery was made, for 2 days I saw police/OCME folks going in and out of the lot.)

Obviously this case is sad and horrific beyond comprehension. And since this discovery was made on my territory (the lot is the epicenter of neighborhood littering/dumping so I always have cleanup to do around there), it is very close to my heart. I always think of the person when I'm working on 43rd Avenue. I have been checking the OCME's online listing of unidentified bodies in NAMUS since April, but the latest Queens listing was from 2012. I had feared that this case was deemed hopeless and already filed away in a dusty precinct basement. Thus, I was very grateful to see the update (release of sketch) today. I hope this man can be identified and given a proper burial by his loved ones.

Police sketch of the gentleman whose body was found in the 43rd Ave lot in April

Up until now, the only thing the public knew was that body parts including a skull with some hair were found. This week, the police released additional details including the fact that the victim was male, white, and approximately 30 years old. They also released 4 sketches.

It would also be helpful to find out his height and his estimated date of death, and whether any jewelry or clothing were found. Maybe those details are forthcoming. I wonder if these were skeletonized remains. I walked by the lot every day and never noticed a smell.

**I also wonder what else is in the lot. From what I can see through the cracks in the fence, the weeds are about 4 feet high, as are the garbage piles. How do the authorities know that there aren't more clues in there, or, God forbid, more bodies?!!

Sorry, I'm getting carried away (though I think I make a valid, albeit crazy-sounding, point).

If you recognize this man, and/or have information about the murder, please call 1-800-577-TIPS or submit your tip online.

For the more pecuniarily motivated folks: you can receive up to $2000 if your tip leads to arrest/indictment (read the details on the CrimeStoppers web site). Tips can be anonymous.

Please, if you know anything about this man, call CrimeStoppers.


3:40pm: I just checked NAMUS; the case report is now up!!!https://identifyus.org/en/cases/full_report/13060

According to the NAMUS report, his height was estimated to be 5'8. Condition of body was "near complete or complete skeleton" (hence the lack of decomp odor on 43rd?). His age was actually between 20 and 30 years. Race/ethnicity was either White or Hispanic.
 or Hispanic. And estimated interval between date of death and

 

 

If you google the GPS coordinates that are included in the NAMUS report, a picture of this fence comes up! So I guess that at least some of the bags were found in here, and others along the hill leading to the railroad tracks-?

The lot (pre-October-paintjob).

Arrow points to the spot where people tend to leave their piles of commercial/household/personal refuse.
Also, you can sort of see where the lot-garbage seeps out under the fence- yum!

 

"Sometimes I feel discouraged"

I like to believe that what I do (pick up litter, call 311 to report dumping, and maintain this whiney log of neighborhood filth) results in some small good. But when I was walking to the train this morning, I became increasingly sad with each step I took. The less-than-3-block walk from my dwelling place to the train station is always so full of litter that I can quickly fill a shopping bag, and it culminates in the filthiest sidewalk and gutter that I have ever seen in person (and I grew up in freakin' Flatbush).

 

 

How is this acceptable?!??

How did this become the norm?

How do people walk by in droves every day and not even blink? 

How do businesses operate 10 feet from this level of filth and not feel the slightest compulsion to clean up?

And why do people continue to patronize businesses, which, by not cleaning this curb, are giving a hearty Eff You to everybody who has to walk by (over/though) this rot?

Our Councilman has arranged for 20 weeks of increased Sanitation pick-up in this area. I do notice that the corner garbage can is usually empty enough to actually serve its purpose of being a viable litter depository (usually the few and far between neighborhood bins are overflowing at all times). In fact, this morning the corner can was completely empty- they must have just picked up when I came along. All of the contents you see in the trash can below were put there by me after my short walk down 74th Street to the Roosevelt Avenue train station. Actually, the large Modell's bag I used was overflowing by the time I reached the end of the 2nd block. Really, really depressing.

Can contents = litter collected on one side of 74th Street between 43rd and Roosevelt

 

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Below is a photo of some local politician's (?) or maybe a Sanitation official's (?) or Mall exec's (?) idea of a joke: paper and bottle recycling cans outside the Queens Center Mall. This would be well and good if there were also several TRASH cans (or one really big one). But for whatever reason, there are only these recycling cans. Is it any wonder that people have taken to using them as trash cans? And that they are overflowing? The Queens Center Mall is one of the most heavily trafficked malls in the USA. Yet despite the fact that people spend obscene amounts of money on the crap-food and synthetic-fibered clothing purveyed therein, the mall does not see fit to arrange for its patrons to have access to a simple ol' garbage can. There are trash cans inside, but what about outside? There are hordes of people outside the mall at all times, many of them going to or coming from the mall. Of course they are going to produce trash. What do you think happens to all those Pretzelmaker wrappers? You got it: they end up shoved in one of the recycling bins, and when the bins overfloweth, on the sidewalk.

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With the garbage cans overflowing, or not even present, where is one to dispose of their trash? Why, right on 43rd Avenue of course!----yes, even if your "trash" is actually a bizarrely-contained collection of bodily fluids. Anything goes on 43rd, right?

43rd Avenue. Nov 2, 2014
Thankfully this had been run over so most of the contents were gone, but there was
enough leftover for me to quickly identify it as a good old Elmhurst water balloon. Yep.

43rd Avenue. Nov 2, 2014
Canada Dry bucket o' liquid gold (mislabeled "Seltzer Water")

 

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Meanwhile, my friends the smokers were up to their usual activities this weekend. Actually, I found their leftovers on Woodside and 74th; I guess they had to move from their usual location (behind the abandoned corner building on 43rd). I think it's because the house next door to the abandoned building started turning on a big floodlight that shines right down on the alley where I discovered the Ziploc bag of blunt remnants last week.

 

Woodside Avenue and 74th Street. Nov 3, 2014

"Taxi Cab Syndrome"

I saw a news blurb about a recently published review article by urologists at Home Depot Infirmary NYU Langone Medical Center (citation below). This article draws attention to the very disturbing fact that cab drivers do not have time or opportunity to void regularly. As disgusted as I am by the Elmhurst water balloons, I realize that they are a sign of a very real humanitarian problem: people who drive cabs are denied the basic dignity of being able to void regularly (in a proper receptacle, I mean), and this can have very harmful effects on their bodies.

Cab drivers do not have time to stop and try to (1)find parking and (2)find a public restroom. Cab drivers work pretty much constantly during their longgggg shifts (usually 12 hours or thereabouts), trying to find enough fares to just break even some days, much less make a profit. Second of all, I have personally noticed that fast food joints and chains in the ciuidad are becoming stricter about the use of their facilities; it is becoming common practice to print a bathroom code on a receipt because the bathrooms are kept locked to the non-costumer. [As a customer, I appreciate this policy; hopefully this will cut down on the general filth of Starbux bathrooms, which often serve as public bathhouses, and even as hook-up spots... true story: once I waited outside a Bay Ridge Starbux bathroom for about 15 minutes after a teen couple went in; heck, it's cheaper than a motel.]

The article points out the deleterious GU effects that result from irregular voiding: "voiding dysfunction, infertility, urolithiasis, bladder cancer, and urinary infections."

What can be done about this? I've only read the abstract so far, so I don't know what the experts recommend. I think the simple, cheap, and generally effective solution would be to encourage cab drivers to invest in a bedside urinal. These things can be purchased for a buck or two in any medical supply store (or ordered online in bulk). They can be used right in the car (I would hope users also invest in a bottle of hand sanitizer), and emptied in a gutter. Thus, no more P-bags or Poland Spring amber-liquid bottles, no more creepy episodes of public urination, and, hopefully, regular voiding and less GU pathology for cabbies.

 

 

Mass AY, Goldfarb DS, Shah O. Taxi cab syndrome: a review of the extensive genitourinary pathology experienced by taxi cab drivers and what we can do to help. Reviews in Urology 2014;16(3):99-104.       

To sum up:

October 25 on the Avenue

This past Saturday, 43rd Avenue was visited by the Woodside Neighborhood Association. The Woodside crew is composed of volunteers who perform hands-on work including garbage pick-up, graffiti remediation, weed whacking, planting, etc. The really remarkable thing about this group is that it is composed of a great many kids. When I was 12, I doubt that I would have spent my Saturday morning painting over graffiti or picking up litter. But the kids in the WNA are great: mature, dedicated, and very careful/conscientious in their work.

Wonderful volunteers of the Woodside Neighborhood
Association hard at work on 43rd Avenue

The Woodside volunteers painted the railroad overpass, as well as the final piece of the graffiti-covered temporary fence around the abandoned lot. They also cleaned up the weeds and the fallen leaves, and picked up trash. This was a big crew, and they worked for many hours. I am so grateful for their visit to the Avenue! And I am sure that other people who live nearby appreciate their work as well. One of the neighbors I met Saturday said as much: he was an older gentleman walking with a cane. He stopped to watch the activity. He said that he was so saddened by the way people treat this area, throwing garbage all over, etc., and he thanked us for trying to clean it up. I would guess that there are other neighbors like him, ie, people who are really bothered by the filth of 43rd but do not have the physical ability to pick up trash themselves. They are left to depend on their more able-bodied neighbors, but for whatever reason, these folks do not step up. Why people do not take responsibility for garbage - even if it's right on their own property- I do not know. "Garbage indifference" (I came across that term on the CleanUpJamaica blog) is prevalent around here. I thought of some possible explanations for garbage indifference:

1. People renting apartments may consider litter management the building owner's (or super's) responsibility.
2. People feel like picking up litter- even from their own front lawn- is pointless since litter is everywhere. I admit that this was my attitude for 4 years.
3. They are not bothered by litter. I watched enough TLC shows to realize that there are some people who seem to have a high tolerance for filth and crap and junk, etc.

Of these, the 2nd is probably the most likely explanation for garbage indifference. That is, people are not really indifferent at all, but there is just SO much litter that they are overwhelmed at the thought of trying to clean up. They feel like they have no choice but to live in filth.

Some people realize that they DO have a choice, though. This very morning as I was making my way to the train station filling a bag with 74th Street litter, I noticed that a young man stooped down every few feet and picked up a few pieces of litter (he did not have a bag with him, but he picked up as much as he could carry in his bare hands). I should have said something to him as we unloaded our collections into the garbage can on the corner, but honestly I was too surprised to speak. I thought of him for the entire train ride to work though, and belately came up with some words of wisdom for fellow litter-picker-uppers:

(1) Accept the fact that litter pick-up is a Sisyphean task, but do it anyway. I guarantee that as soon as you pick up a piece of litter, someone will come along a few minutes later and replace it. The streets will probably never be completely litter-free. Hence, litter-pickin-upping can seem futile and pointless. But it's not!!! I promise you, it's worth it. It does make a difference. People notice, and if they can, they will take measures to combat litter as well (either by picking up litter themselves, or at least being conscious about not adding more litter).

(2) Protect yourself! During my daily 74th Street pick-ups, I find litter that likely has saliva or phlegm on it (bottles, tissues, forks, coffee cups, straws). I've seen bloody litter too (bloody bandages and tissues). And don't even get me started on the kinds of things I find on 43rd. So, please do not use your bare hands to touch litter/potential fomites. You never know what pathogens are present.

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 I shall leave you with the highlights of this weekend's 43rd Avenue trash. (Thankfully there was no dumping this week!!!)

Envelope with cigar(?blunt?) that I found on the side of the Avenue's vacant house

I don't even know what to make of this stack of Activia yogurts on the railroad overpass



The  preferred (by the OGCLE) alternative to the Elmhurst Water Balloon. If this is what I think it is (as opposed to apple juice), then the person who produced it really needs to drink more water.

October 17-18, 2014

I checked 43rd Avenue Friday night, and found this modest* pile (*I guess my standards are so low by now that I consider this pile relatively benign); it included the following:

• the backs of a couple old televisions
• window frames with glass
• a bag of rusted aerosol cans of cleaning fluid (not pictured)

I was conflicted about calling 311 at first since it would have been easy to just drag these few items home and put them out with my own garbage. But I wasn't sure if Sanitation would pick up such items with household trash, and, more importantly, I wanted to make an official complaint about yet another incident of illegal dumping in the same exact spot as the illegal dumping incident of the week before, and the week before that, etc. Oh, and I wasn't too eager to handle the bag of aerosol cans of mystery fluid; I told the 311 operator about these, so hopefully the Sanitation workers who collected them were forewarned.

 

Complaint number 2014MLCO04729; called in 10/17/14

 

Pile of dumped materials that I noticed on October 17, 2014

 

The pile was gone by the next morning. Woohoo!!!

Thank you (again!) DSNY!!!!!

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I am happy to report that this weekend someone began Phase II of the 43rd Avenue Clean-Up Project. [Phase I=basics like trash removal, while Phase II involves beautification attempts such as planting perty flowers or, in this case, graffiti remediation.] Someone painted the graffitied-upon and generally dilapidated-to-the-point-of-being-wrist-slashingly-depressing temporary fence that serves as a beacon to people who are looking for a place to unload their household and industrial waste. The temporary fence surrounds yet another abandoned piece of the Avenue. Once upon a time there was a decent-sized house here; it was torn down several years ago, and the property (which someone nominally owns, according to the Buildings Department sign) has been untouched since. Wait, I take that back: this past April a man collecting bottles made a horrible find either in the confines of the lot or along the adjacent railroad tracks. The few and pithy media accounts gave vague and conflicting reports of the exact location, but I can tell you that for a couple days the fence was open just enough for police and forensics personnel to stream in and out, and the sidewalk along the entire length of the fence was taped off from the public. I didn't know what was going on at the time, and the cops would only say that they were "conducting an investigation." I hope they can solve this case; I feel SO bad for the person they found here. I just pray that they will be identified and can have a proper burial.

Ugh, who knows what other horrible things are in that abandoned lot? Sometimes I peek through the cracks, but all I see is a field full of 4-foot-high weeds. I suppose all  that we (the folks who live nearby) can do is take care of the situation on the other side of the fence.

Anyway, here are the Before and After pictures.



Arrow pointing to the "nasty corner"-- the exact location of most of the piles I encounter.



Perhaps now that the fence is cleaned up a bit, people will be less likely to assume this is an abandoned property/area and less likely to dump here-?!?!? Ya think? Or was that poor tired fence painter just incredibly naïve?

Look out!

The October 3-5, 2014 Report.

Thankfully there were no 311-worthy piles of garbage on 43rd Avenue this weekend. Just the usual scattered debris, e.g.:



Empty bottle, condom box, and condom wrapper
(thankfully they did not leave behind an Elmhurst whitefish) 


 

Friday was a wild night on 43rd, as usual. Someone enjoyed a bottle of Hennessy and some adult time.

The only interesting (in an unusual/disturbing way) find was a freakin' LAWN DART. This thing was scary. It was surprisingly heavy, and I imagine it could cause serious injury. I  have since looked up lawn darts, and found that they were in fact responsible for several deaths. The Consumer Safety Commission issued an alert and ban in 1997. I don't know how or why this one ended up here. For one thing, there are no lawns. What the heck was this dart used for? I don't really want to know, actually.

On a non-garbage note: Saturday night around 9pm I was walking along a dark stretch of Woodside Avenue when a creepy thing happened: a big white van was keeping pace with me. It was going almost as slowly as I was walking (there weren't many other cars sharing the road). A guy in the passenger seat was leaning out the window making some sort of vocalization that sounded like "ooh, ooh!" in my direction (I had my headphones on so I couldn't make out what- if anything- he was trying to articulate). At one point I stopped in my tracks, and the van stopped too, but thankfully there were a few other cars on the road by that time so the van had to restart a moment later. I kind of slowed down so he(?) would have to keep driving along with the other cars, and that is how I lost him. But still, it was pretty unnerving. I have to remember that Halloween approacheth, and the neighborhood gets even sketchier on Halloween (I haven't witnessed anything myself, but my neighbor who has lived here 20+ years has all kinds of stories; Halloween is supposedly a big gang initiation night). So everyone please be wary, especially of big, white, new-looking, unmarked vans!

October 8, 2014. My poor confused neighbor R.M.

At this point in my career as an amateur garbage collector (is it week 3 already?), I really should not be surprised by anything I find on 43rd Avenue. However, despite the fact that I have picked up a wide range of nasty goodies, up until last night I was still under the naïve belief that I would be safe from having to handle a stranger's underwear. Alas, here is the scene that greeted me:





And....



 



Here's a close-up of one of the labels, with the addressee's
 name and addy obscured.

I don't know how long this pile had been there. I usually only walk the Avenue on Saturdays and Sundays, because I don't have time to clean during the week and seeing garbage piles upsets me greatly. However, I guess I was feeling wild and crazy last night, because I took a chance and stole a glance down 43rd Avenue. Even in the dark from down the block, and despite my deteriorating visual acuity, I could see a big pile in the usual dumping spot. In addition to the underwear, there was a stack of cardboard boxes and a big trash bag full of what feels like paint cans. Interestingly, the boxes all had address labels still affixed. This makes me think that (1) the person who dumped these boxes  (R.M., the addressee?) really isn't very bright, or (2) maybe the boxes were stolen from R.M.'s front step and it was the thief who left the boxes on 43rd. But I don't think this is the case. The boxes were stacked somewhat neatly. If someone were going to steal boxes from someone's property, would they want to keep them stacked together? It seems more logical to dispose of them in separate places, or just toss them over the fence to the railroad tracks. My guess is that R.M. was considerate enough to try to keep his or her pile of crap more or less neat and in one place, because that would make things easier for the magic garbage fairy. (FWIW, I picture a garbage fairy looking like Courtney Love circa 1995: a hot mess, furious but in possession of an indomitable spirit and a pure heart. When people see her at work they say "Thank you! I love you for doing this" and she snarls back, "How do you know you can love me?" as she tosses another Styrofoam takeout  bucket into her garbage bag.)