Get Me To The Navy Yard On Time
This photo comes to us from a reader who got the chance to spend some time going through an old-time Clinton Hill resident’s photographs recently. The picture was taken from a roof on the south side of Dekalb looking down at the corner of Dekalb and Adelphi. (The bus is coming from Willoughby towards Dekalb.)…
This photo comes to us from a reader who got the chance to spend some time going through an old-time Clinton Hill resident’s photographs recently. The picture was taken from a roof on the south side of Dekalb looking down at the corner of Dekalb and Adelphi. (The bus is coming from Willoughby towards Dekalb.) According to his account, the bus used to go up and down the blocks of Fort Greene and Clinton Hill picking up the employees for the Navy Yard.
I too would love to see more old photos–also, re: trees–I wonder if there was a big tree-planting push following WWI, cause so many trees have markers honoring soldiers killed in the Great War, plus, in my parent’s day–1930s and 1940s–the poem Trees by Joyce Kilmer, a Brooklyn-born casualty, was a very big deal and everyone their age can recite it. Arbor Day movement from then?
i agree too– this looks more like the corner of adelphi btwn willoughby and myrtle. but really you can’t tell since very little of the left side is showing… i would love to see more old photos from the reader who sent this one.
Firm signed off on ill-fated garage project
Wall collapse killed worker
BY HUGH SON
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Months before a garage wall collapsed and killed a Brooklyn construction site worker last week, a controversial architect signed inspection papers taking responsibility for the ill-fated project, the Daily News has learned.
Architect Robert Scarano signed a Buildings Department statement of responsibility last June for wo rk at the 733 Ocean Parkway site where Anthony Duncan was killed by falling concrete blocks last Tuesday.
The document, obtained by The News, specifies Scarano was in charge of the underpinning – shoring up of a neighbor’s foundation during excavation – that Duncan was doing when he was killed.
Buildings Department officials have said the garage wall may have collapsed because workers failed to support the foundation.
Though city regulations allow it, Scarano should never have signed off on the underpinning work because he is an architect and not a structural engineer, said the president of the New York Structural Engineers Association.
“I can’t believe somebody would actually do that; it’s such a dangerous operation,” said Joe Tortorella, who heads a task force advising the Buildings Department on how to make excavation work safer.
Faulty underpinning work is a “huge problem” in the city’s construction boom, and is ofte n the cause of accidents and property damage, Tortorella said.
“It was probably a small project, and they wanted to save money on it,” he said. “We’re trying to tell architects: don’t do this yourself. Get an engineer involved. This is about life safety.”
Scarano also failed to submit required plans detailing how the underpinning was to be safely done. He is now under investigation by the Buildings Department for possible zoning and building code abuses.
The prominent architect, whose award-winning firm has dozens of condo projects across Brooklyn, said he “had no idea” the excavation work had been done.
“Work wasn’t supposed to have started,” said a Scarano spokeswoman. “As far as he was concerned, it was put off until the developer hired a new contractor.”
Two other workers, Arturo Gonzalez and Heng Zheng, also were killed in accidents on Scarano projects since last August.
Architects can approve inspections of their own projects and certify that their plans conform to zoning rules – an honor system that is open to rampant abuse, housing advocates complained.
“Ultimately, it’s a problem with the system,” said Aaron Brashear of Concerned Citizens of Greenwood Heights. “I don’t want to blame Scarano Architects for being unsafe because the system allows them to be.”
Originally published on March 15, 2006
I agree with Anonymous 10:31. If it’s DeKalb and Adelphi, then every single building has been changed, which can’t be true, especially since the photograph would have been taken from about four stories up in the current playground/basketball court. And what is now Sushi D would be facing 90 degrees different way.
I am always surprised by the lack of trees. Does anyone know when street trees were planted in brownstone brooklyn?
This is a gorgeous photograph, very rich. Thank you for sharing it!
The Clinton Hill Co-op was formerly Navy housing.
(I suppose you knew that)
Where exactly is this picture taken from? If this picture is looking down from Dekalb, then almost all those buildings on the right side of the photo were knocked down to create PS20.
To me it looks like its from the corner of Willoughby and Adelphi, looking down to Mrytle. I swear i recognize the gate and hydrangea plant in the lower left corner.