Stripped in Astoria

Wandering aimlessly one day, I encountered this rather badly-equipped automobile just off Northern Boulevard. The historic cradle of the automobile industry in New York City, this stretch of the great thoroughfare hosts several multi-acre car lots, including the famous Major Auto World.

This is the corner of 44th Street and Northern Boulevard, at the heart of what I call the “Carridor.”

From fundinguniverse.com:

Bruce Bendell and his brother Harold began operating a Brooklyn carwash and auto repair shop in 1972. Subsequently they and their father sold used cars and leased new cars in Brooklyn before purchasing Major Chevrolet, a Long Island City distributor, in 1985. At this time the dealership was in decline, with only 500 cars and $10 million in annual sales. By 1990 sales had increased tenfold. In 1996 Bendell’s Major Automotive Group was doing about $180 million a year in business. One of New York’s largest auto dealerships, it now consisted of six franchises, including Major Chevrolet/Geo; Major Dodge; and Major Chrysler, Plymouth, Jeep Eagle, in Long Island City, plus, in Woodside–another Queens community–Major Subaru, in addition to Major Fleet and Leasing, the leading supplier of taxis and police cars in New York and also a lessor of trucks.

I haven’t witnessed a car deconstructed in this manner for many years, perhaps as many as twenty. Once a common sight in the City of Greater New York, before “Giuliani Time,” this car was stripped of wheels and electronics, and the entire act probably took less than five minutes to accomplish — if the professionalism of the thieves guild has held up since the old days.

From Wikipedia:

Starting in 2005, New York City achieved the lowest crime rate among the ten largest cities in the United States. Since 1991, the city has seen a continuous fifteen-year trend of decreasing crime. Neighborhoods that were once considered dangerous are now much safer. Violent crime in the city has dropped by three quarters in the twelve years ending in 2005 with the murder rate at its lowest then level since 1963 with only 539 murders that year, for a murder rate of 6.58 per 100,000 people, compared to 2,245 murders in 1990. In 2009, the low would be displaced. Among the 182 U.S. cities with populations of more than 100,000, New York City ranked 136th in overall crime.

Astoria is a neighborhood that enjoys a good rumor, and the legend transmitted to me described this vandalized auto as having played some symbolic role in a love affair gone wrong and having suffered the angry attentions of some spurned suitor. There may be very little truth in this, as Astoria rumors are often fanciful and wholly concocted by the idle.

At any rate, the vehicle ended up here in the “Carridor” to receive an obviously required series of repairs.

One observes many shattered vehicles parked around these large auto dealers which have been involved in accidents or some other calamity, and are awaiting repair. Seldom, though, do you see something this “Old School” in modern day NYC.

Luckily, a fix for any of your automotive problems can always be found in the Carridor of Western Queens.

An article from 1993, twenty years ago, at the New York Times, when NYC was the car theft capital of the world…

Last year, from January through September, 94,724 vehicles were stolen in New York City. That’s about 126,000 cars a year, or 345 a day. New York City leads the U.S. in auto thefts, with 139,977 in 1991, or twice the number reported by the second place finisher, Los Angeles. Despite the number of cases, or perhaps because of it, the police seem uninterested in the average theft.