When It Was A Gravel Rider's Dream

Following the trail further, the hardy voyager wandered over 'hills and valleys, dales and fields' through a countryside where trout, mink, otter, and muskrat swam in the brooks and pools; brant, black duck, and yellow-leg splashed in the marshes and fox, rabbit, woodcock, and partridge found covert in the thicket.

The preceding passage isn't an account of my latest ride, though it could have described other rides I've taken.

I have, however, pedaled down the route followed by the author of that passage.  My latest trek along that thoroughfare--one of many--took me past stores, restaurants, condo and co-op buildings and offices.

Also, I rode in the opposite direction from that of the scribe who penned that passage.  Today, it's the only way one can travel for most of the roadway's length.

I am talking about one of the world's most famous urban byways:  Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.

The section Arthur Bartlett Maurice described ran from about 21st to 28th Streets:  about a mile and a half from the Avenue's southern terminus at Washington Square Park.  He was also narrating a northward ("uptown" in New York parlance) trek; since 1966, all of the Avenue, save for a few blocks at its northern end, has allowed only southbound ("downtown") traffic.

Can you believe this was once a sight along Fifth Avenue?

This month marks 200 years since the Avenue--which was mainly a dirt path--opened.  It had been planned thirteen years earlier; its opening ushered an unprecedented building boom that, decades later, would lead to the stretch abutting Central Park to become "Millionaire's Row" and, later, "Museum Mile."

Or this?

Mind you, I don't make a point of cycling Fifth Avenue.  But there are times when it's an efficient and, given that it doesn't have a protected bike lane, relatively safe way to go.   Because the stretch from 110th to 59th marks the Park boundary, most side-streets dead-end into it, so there are few intersections to navigate.  Also, I find that its traffic patterns and flows are fairly predictable, even along the Midtown sector.

Oh, and I always make sure I wave to Patience and Fortitude when I pass the main New Yave to ork Public Library building.  If they could talk.... 

(Thanks to Esther Crain, the author of one of my favorite blogs--Ephemeral New York--for the tribute to Fifth Avenue's bicentennial.)

Riding Among Pink And Yellow Under A Gray Sky

 I didn't stop for this:

But I did stop for this:

I can't recall seeing cherry blossoms bloom so early in any year before this one.  These trees in Greenpoint, Brooklyn aren't at "peak" yet, but they will be very soon.

Normally, the cherry blossoms here in New York bud and flower a week or two later than the more famous ones in Washington, DC, which put on their show in late March and early April.  I am not a scientist, but something tells me that what I'm seeing isn't just a symptom of a mild winter:  This has hardly been the first in recent years.  I can't help but to think that it's a harbinger of more fundamental changes.

Don't get me wrong:  I am always happy to see the cherry blossoms, whenever they blossom.  But even if the weather was still cold, those lovely pink flowers were a sure sign that Spring had indeed arrived.  So...Does this mean that Spring is indeed arriving earlier?  Or will they become another precursor, like snowdrops and winter jasmine, of a season that is on its way, but has not quite arrived?

I went looking for answers.  Tosca, my Mercian fixed gear bike, led me to this:

A psychic reader under new management?  Does that mean readings will be less vague and more detailed?  That they'll be done faster?  Or that you get your money back if what the reader predicts doesn't come true?

At least my trip to the reader's storefront--which was closed--took me through some interesting vistas.  The block leading to it, (66th Street from Cooper to Myrtle Avenues) looked like a valley of "Ridgewood Yellow:"

Not surprisingly, I saw a couple of pro-police banners.  Not so long ago, Ridgewood was home to many officers.  I'll bet that some worked here:

The former headquarters of the eight-three (police parlance for the 83rd Precinct) is now a command station for that precinct, and several others in Brooklyn.  That doesn't surprise me, though on first glance, I would've thought it was an armory.

A desk officer saw me wandering around and came to the door.  "Can I help you?"  I explained that I simply had to stop and look at the building.  He then explained its history to me and told me the part of the building in which he was posted had been a horse stable.  

I tried to imagine it when the neighborhood--Bushwick--was home to German and Italian immigrants who probably would've been dressed in their "Sunday best" for church.  Apparently, the  young woman with pink hair and they young man in a long yellow paisley coat had no such thought:  It was just another building they passed on their way to the Cal-Mex cafe.

I guess pink and yellow, wherever they're seen under a gray sky, are signs that the season--whatever it is-- is here, or on its way.

Permission To Roam

My orthopedic doctor and the Texas governor said, basically, the same thing yesterday.

Now, I don't  know much about my doctor's politics, but he probably has never thought about Greg Abbott in his life. So how could they have echoed each other?

Well, the Governor told businesses in his state that, starting next week, restaurants and other businesses can open fully.  "People want to go back to living," he said.  He's declared that they can.  

My doctor gave me the same permission.  He confirmed what I suspected:  My injuries from getting "doored" are healed, save for two still-visible scars.  They'll take "about a year" to disappear, he said.  In the meantime, I could use a skin ointment, but if I should I should "be careful" because I have sensitive skin.  Looking at my helmet, he grinned and crooned, "Enjoy."

It's been more than a month since I did two of my regular long rides (Connecticut and Point Lookout).  The reason is not my injuries:  rather, it's the snow and ice that's covered many of the roads.  Also, Marlee seems to be guided by her animal instinct to hibernate and takes any chance she can to curl up on me and doze.  She's so cute, and calms me as much as a meditation or therapy session, that I want to stay with her.

I want to get out because, even on rides I've done dozens of times before, I notice something or another that previously escaped my attention--or wasn't there. During my ride to the doctor's office, a traffic light stop at Third Avenue and 17th Street brought this into my view:

I hadn't been inside that building in years--or looked at its exterior.  Whenever I entered, I listened to music or poetry.  I don't know whether its architectural details were covered, or perhaps I just hadn't noticed them because I always arrived at night, when throngs of people fronted and filled it.

Perhaps I will always think of that building--as long as it's still there--Fat Tuesday's, the jazz club/performance space that occupied it for years.  It closed around 15 years ago, when the changes I've witnessed in this city accelerated.  After that, it was occupied by a variety of venues, including a yoga and Pilates studio.

But, as you can see, the designers and builders of the edifice probably didn't envision any of the venues I--or most people living today--associate with it. Constructed in 1894-95, it originally served as a restaurant and beer garden.  The latter is not surprising when you realize that the surrounding neighborhood--Gramercy Park/Irving Place--was, at the time, said to be the home of more Germans than any place outside of Europe.  

The building would later host the German-American Athletic club and the German-American Rathskeller.  Given this history, it's makes sense that it's named for Joseph Viktor von Scheffel, a German poet and novelist.  

I don't know what "Allaires" refers to.  Ironically, when I first saw that name, I thought of a village in Brittany, France (through which I've biked) and a park in New Jersey where I biked, hiked and camped as a teenager.  That park was named for James Allaire, who owned an ironworks and village on the site.  The metal produced there was shipped to Allaire's factory in this city, where parts for steam ships were made.  He had a home on Cherry Street, about a mile from Scheffel Hall, so it's possible that his family owned all or part of the building or businesses that were in it.

One more thing:  Given the building's literary and artistic associations, it's not surprising that O.Henry wrote some of his stories--and set one of them, "The Halberdier of the Little Rheinschloss" in Scheffel Hall.

Anyway, as you can see, I didn't need permission from a doctor or governor to go back to doing the things I normally do:  cycling and learning about whatever I see along the way.  Marlee doesn't always approve, but, hey, nobody's perfect!

Heading For The Kill

Most days, my commute takes me over the Randall's Island Connector, a car-free bridge that runs underneath the Amtrak trestle--and over the Bronx Kill.

Even though crime is at an all-time low in New York City, the Bronx Kill isn't the only "kill" in the Big Apple--or the Empire State. Before the English came in, the Dutch colonized this area, along with nearby parts of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, in the early 17th Century.  "Kill" comes from the Middle Dutch "kille", which means "riverbed" or "water channel".

So New York had lots of kills even before the Mafia started dumping their bodies in them.

Well, the organization J.Edgar Hoover didn't believe in probably wouldn't have left corpses in something so shallow as the Bronx Kill--even when it's full.  Sometimes the waters cover all those pebbly areas on the shore, and beyond.  One morning, the Kill actually flowed just a couple of feet (or so it seemed) below the bridge.

The Bronx Kill's flow has nothing to do with rain.  Rather, it's affected by the ocean currents, as are the other Kills in New York City.  The Bronx Kill connects the East and Harlem Rivers, both of which are misnamed because they are  tidal estuaries.   Like the Bronx Kill, they have no current of their own:  The direction of their flow is dictated by the tides.

Even with the water so low, I am glad the Connector exists.  My younger self might have ignored the junk revealed by the receding tide and hopped across while hoisting my bike. Or I might have gone looking for the Randall's Island Salamander.

Bikes From The Night The Lights Went Out

I took Tosca, my Mercian fixed gear, out for a spin this morning. My plan was to finish before the worst of the heat and humidity we would experience this afternoon.  I succeeded at that, and at avoiding the downpour that would end them.

My ride took me through, among other places, the non-hipster parts of Williamsburg, Brooklyn.  Believe it or not, they still exist, mainly south of the Williamsburg Bridge and east of Bedford Avenue.  They are, in some ways, time-capsules of what this city was like, say, 40 years ago.

On this date in 1977, one of the most infamous blackouts in history darkened New York City.  Brooklyn's Broadway, which cuts through the borough from the East River to East New York, incurred some of the most serious looting and arson that night in a city that was already suffering from a reputation for anarchy.  

At that time, all of Williamsburg--and much of the rest of this city--bore more resemblance to  today's South and East Williamsburg than it does to the nightlife capital to its north and west.  Hipster-equivalents of that time never would have ventured into such a place:  In fact, about the only young white people to be found were those who were born and raised there and hadn't gone to college, joined the military or gotten out in some other way.   And, perhaps, a few punk-rockers and anti-establishment artists, who are practically the antithesis of hipsters.

You see, in the year Howard Cosell supposedly exclaimed, "The Bronx is Burning!", most residents of neighborhoods like Williamsburg were poor or blue-collar.   If they were white (usually Italian, German or Irish) they weren't young.  Those who were young, or even middle-aged, were likely to be Puerto Rican, Black or Hasidic Jews--like the folks who live in the non-hipster enclaves today.

I saw them on the streets today: the kids running and doing the kinds of things kids do everywhere when school's out.  Their mothers were never more than a few steps away, propped against poles or fences or sitting on stoops in front of the houses.  

Even with the hipsters nowhere to be seen, I saw plenty of bikes.  Some were being ridden, mainly by folks like me who were pedaling through the neighborhood.  Others were chained to parking meters, signposts and other immovable objects.  Ironically, they might have been new--or, at least, not more than a few years old--during the days to which I've alluded, but I probably would not have seen them because, in those days, there were relatively few cyclists in this city, and almost none in neighborhoods like the ones I've mentioned.

I saw this French ten-speed bike from around the mid-1970's as I spun down Franklin Avenue:

Paris Sport was a "house" brand for bikes imported by Park Cycle and Sports of Ridgefield Park, New Jersey.  They were made by several French manufacturers, most commonly Dangre-Starnord, a company based in Valenciennes (a northern French town along the Paris-Roubaix race route) that also sold bikes under the France-Sport and Nord-Star brands.

So it's not surprising that the bike resembles machines from Gitane, Jeunet and Mercier made in that era.  What I found interesting, though, were some of the apparent changes.

The reason this bike caught my eye was the Sun Tour bar end shifters ("Barcons").  One rarely sees them on any bike parked on a New York street, and they certainly were not original equipment on the bike.  More likely, the bike had shifters on the down tube or handlebar stem, and they probably would have been made by Huret, the manufacturer of the "Svelto" derailleur that probably is orignial equipment.

Seeing Weinmann "Vainqueur" centerpull brakes on a French bike is not unusual. However, if you look closely, you will see that the "yoke" that pulls on the straddle cable is not Weinmann's.  This one looks clunkier, and the cable hangers on the steerer tube and seat bolt are thinner than the ones that usually came with Weinmann brakes.  The hangers look like they could be Mafac, but may have been from CLB, whose  brakes and fitments (except for their later "Professional" sidepulls) looked like cruder versions of Mafac's offerings.

I am guessing that someone simply replaced parts as they needed replacing, or simply didn't have the money to do a complete "makeover".  (I mean, what else would explain such good shift levers with such ordinary derailleurs?)  I am also guessing that whoever rides the bike now "inherited" it from somebody and has no idea of what I'm talking about.

The same might be said for this bike parked a few blocks away:

It's the first time I've seen a Royce Union--or, for that matter, any bike with a chainguard like that--in such a color.

It looks like the same model as (or one similar to) the Royce Union three-speed my grandfather gave me about three years before I could ride it. Like my old bike, it was made in Japan.  But the color--and the head tube that could have passed for aluminum if not for the rust spots--reminded me of a bike I often saw a couple of decades later:

The Vitus 979 was, of course, one of the first widely-ridden aluminum frames.  It was available in anodized blue, green, gold, red, purple and the pink shown in the above photo.  As much as I love the other colors, whenever someone mentions the Vitus 979, that rose hue is the first that comes to my mind.

Somehow I doubt that the Royce Union came with such a finish.  I suspect that the bike had once been purple or magenta, or perhaps even red, and had faded--a common fate for the paint on Japanese bikes of the time.

At least it's being used, or looks as if it is, if not by its original owner--who may or may not have lived in the neighborhood the night the lights went out.

Into The Hole

Today I rode to a hole.  No, I didn't go to the Grand Canyon.

All right.  I rode to a ghost town.  And, yes, I stayed in the cofines of New York City.

Mind you, it wasn't my destination:  I didn't have one for today.  I just felt like riding and after an overcast morning turned into a sunny and unseasonably warm afternoon.  I rode Vera, my green Mercian mixte, with no particular itinerary in mind.  I just pedaled forward and turned whenever it looked interesting or I simply got tired of the street or lane I was riding.

I briefly covered a part of yesterday's ride:  through Howard Beach and Beach Channel, the latter of which is partly contained in the Gateway National Recreation Area.  Vera gave me a couple of brief encounters with the ocean, but the bodies of water I saw, mainly, were ones that open into the Atlantic--namely Jamaica Bay and Starrett Creek.

And this:

As we've all been told, immigrants of my grandparents' generation were lured to America by rumors that the streets were "paved with gold".  Well, there is a street under that puddle, or whatever you want to call it, made of emerald.  All right, that's a bit of an exaggeration.   But the street is called Emerald Street.  A block away is another venue called Ruby Street; nearby thoroughfares are Amber and Sapphire Streets.  

In a perverse irony, these "jewel" streets comprise a neighborhood--if it might be called that--commonly called "The Hole."  It's easy to see why:  the land drops about five meters from the grade of Linden Boulevard--which itself lies below sea level.  According to some reports, that puddle lies 30 feet (9 meters) below sea level.

In another twist, the nearest building that has any connection to the rest of the world is about 50 meters away but seems to have its back turned to it: a psychotherapy center.  And, across Linden Boulevard--a.k.a. New York State Route 27--from it is the Lindenwood Diner, where travelers to and from JFK Airport and truckers to and from all points imaginable stop for burgers, shakes and such.

To give you an idea of how desolate--or, at least, how far removed from the rest of the city--The Hole is, no one seems to know whether it's in Brooklyn or Queens.  Perhaps it's a separate borough?  It certainly seems to exist in another time, if not jurisdiction.

That puddle in the photo might've been a result of the snow we had last week.  But, from what I hear, there's almost always an unnatural wetland there.  The Hole is, to my knowledge, the only part of New York City that doesn't have sewers--people use septic tanks and drains--because the land is too close to the water table.  

That geographic feature is probably a reason why it most likely shares agrarian past with the neighboring Brooklyn community of East New York.  In the late 19th Century, Brooklyn was--believe it or not--the second-largest (after southern New Jersey) vegetable-producing area in the US.  No doubt some of the folks living there--off the grid--are growing tomatoes or cabbages or other vegetables in patches of sod surrounded by rubble-strewn or weed-grown lots.  Most of the houses are abandoned; the people who call the area home are living in trailers, campers or trucks--with or without wheels.

The Federation of Black Cowboys stabled their horses in The Hole (and a few Cowboys lived there) until about a decade ago, when the city housing authority chased them out in order to erect middle-class housing that, to date, hasn't been built. In 2004, bodies of Mafia figures were found there, confirming longstanding rumors that the area was a mob dumping ground.  

Anyway, I have a rule when I ride:  If I can't see the bottom of any body of water I won't ride through it, unless there's no other way.  Not even if I'm riding a bike with full fenders, as I was today!

Where These Tracks Could Lead

Back when I was doing a pretty fair amount of off-road riding, I often sluiced through the hills and gullies of Forest Park in Queens.  I was living in Park Slope then, and the park--which was bigger and less agressively policed than Prospect--was about half an hour away. So, on a spring or summer day, I could get in a ride after work.

Since I sold my Bontrager and stopped riding off-road, I have cycled to Forest Park, but not in it.  That is, until today.

Most of the park lies to the west of Woodhaven Boulevard.  But the part to the east is more thickly wooded and has a few other interesting geological features the other side lacks.  (Or, perhaps, the west side had them but they were obliterated by the golf course, bandshell and other things built there.)  I was riding south, toward JFK airport, when I espied one of the paths I used to ride.  It wasn't very long and ended abruptly in the trotting course, where other cyclists and I used to upset the horse riders.  I didn't see any today.

But I saw something more interesting, at least to me (or in terms of this blog):

 Did I never notice the track all those times I rode off-road?  Or did I forget about it?

When I chanced upon it, a cute tuxedo cat scurried across.  I don't know how long it's been since a train last rumbled and clattered over it, but I'm sure it's been decades.   It parallels a Long Island Rail Road (Yes, it's spelled as two words!) line that runs through another part of the neighborhood.  Perhaps some now-discontinued branch of the line ran here.  Or, maybe, freight trains:  The Atlas Park mall is about a kilometer to the southwest.  It used to be an industrial park (That phrase seems so strange) that, at one time, housed General Electric, Kraft, Westinghouse, New York Telephone and other large companies.  There are still some small factories as well as warehouses near the mall.

Anyway, I can't see abandoned railroad tracks without thinking, "Now this would be a great bike path!"  Old rail lines have been so re-purposed in other places; if the same were done to the tracks I saw today, they could be linked to the nearby section of the Brooklyn-Queens Greenway , which might one day be a continuous greenway that connects Brooklyn and Queens. 

Sleepless As What's Under Them

The other day I got out for a bit of a ride.  On my way home, I passed through the Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill neighborhoods of Brooklyn.  

The Heights abuts the waterfront and the Hill is next door.  Both neighborhoods have been the home of a number of writers, especially poets--including the ones everyone's heard of like Walt Whitman, Hart Crane and Marianne Moore and ones only readers of this blog have heard of, like yours truly.

Anyway, much of the Heights gentrified decades ago--in fact, one of the first landmarked districts in the United States lies within the neighborhood.  Cobble Hill is also turning into an enclave of young professionals and families.  

One result of those demographic changes--and shifts in the city's, nation's and world's economy--is that much of the city's maritime history is disappearing.  I know about those developments firsthand:  Two of my uncles were maritime workers and their union headquarters once occupied an entire square block, and a good part of another, in South Brooklyn.  One of my early birthdays was celebrated in its reception hall; so were milestones in the lives of other family members of longshoremen and other workers.  Now that square-block sized building is occupied by the largest Muslim elementary school in America and the maritime workers are relegated only to a couple of offices in the other building.

One of the last remaining vestiges of the work those men (almost all of them were male) did is seen on this building I passed on Atlantic Avenue, near Clinton Street:

The former headquarters and workshop of John Curtin's sail-making operation is now condominums, with a restaurant and Urban Outfitters store in its street-level studios. 

Riding through the neighborhood made me think of this passage from Hart Crane's masterwork The Bridge:

 Sleepless as the river under thee,
Vaulting the sea, the prairies’ dreaming sod,
Unto us lowliest sometime sweep, descend
And of the curveship lend a myth to God.