Sandbags along the Gowanus

 

The tide is extremely high tonight and the anticipated rain has not even started. The boats are swaying and anything that is in the canal is thrashing about. Houses in the Zone A areas did not really seem evacuated but precautions were being taken as far as putting tape on windows and sandbags on cellar doors

340-342 Bond Street waits for Hurricane Sandy at 9 PM on Sunday night. 

This Scarano condo building at 340-342 Bond Street had all it's doors fortified with sandbags.

 

Recently the Gowanus/Carroll Gardens community has learned that developer Lightstone Properties wants to build a 700 unit apartment building on this very block - directly on the shores of the Gowanus Canal in a CATEGORY A EVACUATION ZONE!

 

It makes me wonder.

 

Is this project about creating safe housing for people or really about developers making ruthless profit by putting people in harms way?

 

Building on a Federal Superfund Site seems like a bad idea to start but to also build in a flood plain in which the floods include raw sewage makes it even a worse idea. And to build in a place that right now is in the midst of a MANDATORY EVACUATION seems like a REALLY REALLY BAD IDEA!

 

 In fact there was supposed to be a hearing about it tomorrow but it's been cancelled due to the hurricane!

 

Now is the time for our elected officials and City Planning to start opening up their eyes.

 

Climate change is real and we are living it now.

 

Click here to contact 39th District Councilman Brad Lander to voice your concern and here for City Planning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

D.E.P Press Conference in Gowanus * Monday 10:30 AM

Just passing along this info. You know those pipes that appeared in the Gowanus a while back that later were submerged and are marked by those floating balls? Apparantly they have successfully added enough oxygen into the canal to sustain the temporary shutdown of the Flushing Tunnel. I hope so because the canal has been smelling and looking nastier than I have seen in years!

The Department of Environmental Protection is holding a press conference to announce that this is so. The community is welcome to attend and to hopefully find out more.

As per their email:

Community Notice: DEP Completes Key Milestone at the Gowanus Canal

Please join the New York City Department of Environmental Protection for a press conference on Monday, July 19, 2010 at 10:30 A.M. at 213 Douglass Street, Brooklyn. There, Deputy Commissioner of Sustainability Carter Strickland will announce the successful operation of the temporary Oxygenation System. This key milestone which will add oxygen to the Gowanus Canal during the planned shutdown of the Flushing Tunnel.

This work is being undertaken to support the $140 million Gowanus Facilities Upgrade, which will decrease the number of combined sewer overflows to the Gowanus Canal. The upgrade is scheduled for completion in summer 2013.

When: Monday at 10:30 AM
Where: 213 Douglass Street (near Nevins)

*SEWERAMA! * Proteus Gowanus on Sunday

Sewage has been a topic discussed on F.I.B on many a blog post but Proteus Gowanus has taken it 1 million steps furthur by devoting several hours to the topic starting at 4pm on Sunday.

From their press release:

Sewerama!

"A multimedia presentation with all the information you can stomach about our sewers
and how they affect the Gowanus Canal.

The first in a series of events sponsored by
The Hall of the Gowanus
The only exhibition space in NYC dedicated to the Gowanus Canal
A Project of Proteus Gowanus


One of the defining features of modern life is that we can dispose of waste with the push of a button or the crank of a lever and never think twice about the consequences. But still there lurks the nagging question: Are we really rid of it all?

If you live in Prospect Heights, Boerum Hill, Park Slope, or Gowanus and it’s a rainy day, chances are that what you flush down the toilet will end up in the Gowanus Canal. That’s because New York City channels street runoff and household sewage into a Combined Sewer System which responds to excess flow (ie from heavy rains) by discharging it into our waterways.

Will the recent designation of the Gowanus as a Superfund Site solve this problem? The answer is decidedly murky. But that does not mean that solutions are not available. Find out what New York City’s Combined Sewer System means to you and whether there is any hope for the Gowanus Canal, Superfund or no.

PRESENTERS

Novelist Elizabeth Gaffney will read from the chapter “Down the Manhole” in her novel of 19th C New York, Metropolis.

Environmental Planner Kate Zidar and teaching artist Valeria Mogilevich will explain how the Combined Sewer System works by using the Center for Urban Pedagogy’s Sewer In a Suitcase.

Eric Rothstein, Managing Partner of eDesign Dynamics, will describe sustainable methods for reducing combined sewer overflow. These low-impact development methods will include technologies for infiltrating, detaining, and re-using stormwater before it reaches the combined sewer system.

Susannah C. Drake, principal of Dlandstudio, LLC, will present the Gowanus Canal Sponge Park plan, a multifunctional public open space project that slows, absorbs and filters surface water runoff with the goal of remediating contaminated water.

In addition, on display in the Hall of the Gowanus will be The Water Underground, a video by City-As-School high school students in conjunction the Center for Urban Pedagogy (CUP), and other art, artifacts and books relating to the Gowanus."