Surprise! Gowanus Canal is Super Contaminated!
Yesterday the EPA came out with a report from the first phase of a federal investigation into what exactly is in the Gowanus Canal and where it’s actually coming from. If you’re brave enough to read it in full, the PDF can be downloaded here. The Brooklyn Paper breaks down the report, which finds that…
Yesterday the EPA came out with a report from the first phase of a federal investigation into what exactly is in the Gowanus Canal and where it’s actually coming from. If you’re brave enough to read it in full, the PDF can be downloaded here. The Brooklyn Paper breaks down the report, which finds that “uncontrolled discharges of sewage, storm water and other types of discharges into the Gowanus continue to contaminate the canal.” There are more than a dozen contaminants, two of which are suspected carcinogens. Next up the EPA will review different options to clean up the canal and then remove all the existing debris and strengthen the bulkheads. Even after all remediation is said and done, EPA Regional Administrator Judith Enck says, The level of contamination is so severe that I don’t feel comfortable saying that when we’re done, it will be fishable or swimmable. Yeah, we think we’ll pass.
Photo by Jackie Weisburg
By East New York on February 3, 2011 3:23 PM
“no one needs to swim and bathe for it to be a nice feature.”
Who’s talking about swimming or bathing? I wouldn’t get within 50 feet of that “water” if I didn’t have to. It stinks in the summer (not fun)
…
Maybe you smelled yourself? Because you are full of sh#$ if you think it stinks any time of the year.
I walked back and forth over the Carol St. bridge many times 2001 – 2004, and the canal didn’t stink. It even had some jellyfish. It was not scenic, and I wasn’t about to go splashing in the water, but it wasn’t stinky or offensive, at least at the time. Is it worse now?
…Last one in is a rotten egg!!!
err, scratch that.
First one in smells like a rotten egg! :o(
Well I have rode my bike many times near the canal and over the Union, Carroll bridges in the summer, but yet I never smelled anything bad at all, never……I
don’t know why, but I just never did.
I actually saw a bunch of killes (sp) swimming around in it…….
It is just hard to keep the canal clean since the is only one out for the water to go. if the flushing tunnel will ever get fixed, what they are doing now, will be a miracle……
well, actually the regional epa director. see last line of post.
and no, eny, it rarely stinks (even in the summer).
in fact, the nets stink much worse and i still want them in my neighborhood.
“Yet people still want to live, build and develop housing near here and even KAYAK in the water! I don’t understand it. ”
The report is explicity clear – the water is contaminated, not the soil ashore or the air quality. So aside from swimming or eating its fish, it is perfectly safe to live in houses near the canal, as many of us do.
“no one needs to swim and bathe for it to be a nice feature.”
Who’s talking about swimming or bathing? I wouldn’t get within 50 feet of that “water” if I didn’t have to. It stinks in the summer (not fun) and ANY proximity or long-term to the toxic cocktail percolating down there can’t be good.
Y’all have no vision.
I’m with 007 on this point. what? we need 2nd ave extending to atlantic or the pjs? or maybe another bike (pedestrian?) lane?
get rid of the industrial toxic sludge, then deal with raw sewage later.
no one needs to swim and bathe for it to be a nice feature.
if you want to fill something in, i’d be for burying alive the traffic on the bqe in carroll gardens
“Yet people still want to live, build and develop housing near here and even KAYAK in the water! I don’t understand it. ”
It was developers wanted to turn it into a waterfront and park condo project.