Seaporcel Metals Inc
By: Control , Posted on March 29, 2013
Long Island City has been in a constant state of change in recent years. This building was just another victim.
History
This building and lot was once the home of Seaporcel, a metal manufacture who's work seemed to focus on exterior, ornamental steel. The company seemed to be in operation from the 1950s and into the 1960s. They held at least one patent, for '
translucent building panels'. These panels were used in 'modern' buildings, such as the Hartford Statler Hotel, in Connecticut. There's a few photos of this building (aside from the one in the advertisement in the gallery with this write up) online -
this being one of them. Apparently this building was later 'modernized' (and made very ugly) and then bulldozed in 1990.
Around 1960 the company was also having some internal management issues, which lead to at least one lawsuit. Curiously, the plantiff in the case also seemed to own another steel company in Brooklyn according to this
SEC filing. I'm sure there's some interesting stories behind these characters (if anyone wants to dig, by all means let me know what you find).
It just goes to show that not all industries started in L.I.C. survived or made a huge impact in society. Eagle electric, swingline staplers, there were many examples of big businesses born and raised in LIC. Some, like Seaporcel, didn't grow, and soon disappeared.
It just goes to show that not all industries started in L.I.C. survived or made a huge impact in society. Eagle electric, swingline staplers, there were many examples of big businesses born and raised in LIC. Some, like Seaporcel, didn't grow, and soon disappeared.
More recently, the building had a few tenants - a lawyers office and Spring Scaffold - one of the largest scaffold companies in NYC. all of these tenants were given the boot
when Fed Ex decided to build a huge new distribution center across the street on the old
National Envelop property.
The building here was quickly bulldozed, and the property is now a parking lot.
Getting IN
Getting in here was rather easy, though slightly bold. Part of the lot comes up against a space where the Borden Avenue Drawbridge slides into open position ( it is one of 4 'slider' drawbridges in the USA - moving horizontally to allow boats to pass in the creek). There is a ladder down into this spot off the bridge, and randomly enough there was a nice sized hole made in the building wall that proved easy to climb into, even in broad daylight.
Once inside, the lot was largely already cleaned out. The building was a half moldy, half intact juxtaposition of decay and disorder. There really wasn't much to see.
We came back one night and used this spot as a springboard into exploring the old texaco oil facility next door. Currently that property is a truck parking lot. There's only a few small buildings here, most of them sealed up pretty good. In the near silence we heard some security guy wandering around - he seemed to be either trying to find us or talking to himself. Not sure what we were dealing with, we figured maybe this spot-next-door would be best revisited. Any night seeing even a small lot, no matter how seemingly boring, that soon became history was already a mission worth taking.
Miami Marine Stadium
By: Control , Posted on March 26, 2013
An abandoned stadium with awesome views of downtown Miami? Sure.
History
The Miami marine stadium currently is an abandoned wreck. While it is structurally sound, it was closed in 1992 after Hurricane Andrew. Here's a boatload more from
Wikipedia
The 6,566 seat stadium was built in 1963 on land donated for "water sports," and designed by architect Hilario Candela, then-a 28-year-old recent immigrant from Cuba. It was dedicated as the Ralph Munroe Marine Stadium opened, completed at a cost of around $2 million ($15.2 million, adjusted for current inflation). A speed boat racer, James Tapp, was killed on opening day. The venue, located just south of Downtown Miami, was revered for its scenic views of Downtown and Miami Beach, hosting motorboat events, and events featuring the likes of Mitch Miller, Sammy Davis, Jr., and U.S. President Richard Nixon (whose seasonal winter residence, dubbed "the Florida White House," was on nearby Key Biscayne).
Adventure
Our man in Miami, DigitalBeatSyndrome, brought us over here while visiting town. On previous attempts at access, he ran into cops parked out front and gates locked tight. Today though, everything was wide open. Just inside the gate were teams of guys running around the stadium shooting paintballs at each other. There's at least a dozen of these motherfuckers - so we're careful not to walk into one of their firefights. Paintballing isn't a big thing in NYC, so walking into this situation was a bit surreal.
Once up into the seating area the surrealness just grew... up top there's a photo shoot going on with some slinky latin girl. Then we look behind us and there's an old tourist couple just walking around like they own the place.
So much for this place being any sort of challenge to break in. They may as well roll up with tour buses and show everyone the awesome graffiti that can be found within these battered walls.
Future:
Much like NYC's High Line,
Miami's marine stadium will probably be preserved and rebuilt, for better or worse.
Graffiti Tunnel
By: Control , Posted on March 24, 2013
Deep below NYC lays this mythical location, where serious writers put up blockbuster pieces for only the select few that are daring enough to find this subway tunnel to view and enjoy. Here's a sampling of what can be found in this amazing location.
Montauk Steel, Long Island City
By: Control , Posted on March 12, 2013
Montauk Steel was located on Borden Avenue in L.I.C., on land that was once part of the
LIRR's old Wheelspur yard. There is currently very little information about this company on the internet, so here's what I can tell you.
According to The Google, Montauk Iron & Steel put out
this catalog, which is titled:
"Montauk Iron & Steel Co. Manufacture Wrought Iron from Magnetic Ores by the Use of the Danamora Patent Furnaces".
The catalog description gives an overview of what they made:
"The Iron is Entirely Fibrious, Perfectly Uniform, Uncrystaline, Possessing Unequalled Tenacity and Strength; United States Test Gave 76,000 Lbs. Tensional Strength Per Square Inch. : They Manufacture the Montauk Cast Steel from this Iron, which Produces a Superior Steel in Uniformity, Toughness and Strength, Rolled Hammered Or Swedged Into Any Size Or Shape, to Order, for Tools, Drills, Dies, Springs, Tires, Shafts, Arbors, &c. : Also from Their Decarbonized Steel Carbine, Rifle, & Pistol Barrels, Swords, Cultery, &c. : Magnetic Iron Ores, from Their Own Mines, Sold by the Cargo, Delivered at Tide Water, Mott Haven."
They were in business from at least 1941 until 1980. These photos are from 2001 or 2002. The warehouse building here was always locked up real good, and I never saw it actually open or in use. At the time it had faded 'Montauk Steel' lettering painted across it's exterior. The side lot and rear of the building were completely abandoned at that time. In this lot were all the vehicles and strange junk you see in these photos - most of it clearly quite old. The trucks had registration stickers last updated in 1979 and 1980, and had clearly sat rusting for the prior 20 years.
Not long after I took these photos, the lot was cleaned up and is still currently in use. The warehouse, also, is in use.
If you happen to know more about what Montauk Steel did, what working conditions were like, or just their day to day operations and main customers, please comment below.
LIC’s Wheelspur Yard / Poultry Market – Past, Present & Future
By: Control , Posted on March 11, 2013
On the north shore of Newtown creek lays a plot of land with a strangely unique history - a place that was once a rail yard, then a poultry market and later an office for small businesses and other food distributors. All of these are gone now, and soon this land will become a rail yard once again. In a city where real estate is at a premium - such a full circle transformation is unheard of - especially in an area such as L.I.C. - where the city's industrial past has rapidly been whitewashed to make way for high priced housing. Mix in the drama of flooding and fire caused by Hurricane Sandy, and you've got a unique New York story.
History
The key ingredient to this most unlikely tale is that the Long Island Rail Road has owned this property since the 1800s. In the early 1900s, L.I.C. was the hub of the LIRR. There were no tunnels built to Manhattan just yet. All of the property south of Borden Avenue, east of where the present day Pulaski bridge is and west of Dutch Kills (a creek), was one huge rail yard for storing passenger trains. This yard was called 'Wheelspur Yard'. (Note, that the passenger yard west of the Pulaski is generally known as the 'LIC coach yard' - a much larger station with canopies and station building once resided here). Some of the land immediately south of Borden was converted to various buildings - most notable at the moment is the headquarters of Fresh Direct. Behind these buildings lays an LIRR track which, up until very recently, was used a few diesel passenger train runs out to Long Island. South of this track is the location we're focusing on today.
According to
Arrt's Archive, Wheelspur yard was in use from the 1800s until around 1930. it was reopened from 1939-1940 for storing trains for the World's Fair. After this it was used by the Pennsylvania Rail Road (PRR) (which owned the LIRR at the time) to store their passenger trains - until around 1958. PRR kept these cars warm with steam heat generated by several old steam locomotives which were parked and used exclusively for this purpose. Right around this time is when the poultry market came to be. It didn't seem to last very long though - the internet is currently devoid of any mention of it having existed.
At least 2 modern-ish buildings were built here, likely around the 1950s. The furthest to the west was an office building, and the one furthest east was merely a double ended loading dock, where freight cars could be parked on one side and trucks on the other. The middle building may have been a conversion of an old RR shop building - see the photos and judge for yourself. I couldn't find any information on this, and by the time we got in it was too burned up to get a good interior assessment.
Historic maps show these buildings to be 'The NYC poultry market'. One can assume perhaps that the NYC Government tried to run a chicken market here, much like the old Fulton Fish Market or the huge Hunts Point Terminal Market in the Bronx. Whatever the case was, by the 1990s it was being rented out to various food distribution companies. Upon the time of our inspection, leftover cans of Asian food littered the eastern building.
Meanwhile, the westernmost office building hosted a slew of small businesses: a lawyers office, an industrial real estate firm, a messenger service and carpentry shop.
All of these tenants were unceremoniously evicted in the summer of 2012. They had no idea how lucky they were.
Hurricane Sandy
On the evening of October 29th 2012, Newtown creek overflowed its artificial banks. A surge of at least 4-6 feet of water rushed inland. The buildings on the property were hit hard. Much of the contents of the first floor floated out and pushed up against the western fence. Fresh Direct's delivery truck fleet was parked in the lot next door and also sustained heavy damage, putting Fresh Direct out of business for a short while.
Barely 3 weeks later, a major fire broke out in the middle building, where an auto shop was located. The cause of this fire is unknown to me, but it is very possible that the demolition crew tasked with cleaning out these buildings didn't realize it was flood damaged - and an electrical short brought the building to a full blaze, not unlike all of the homes on the Jersey Shore and Rockaway that burned up during and just after the hurricane. The 2nd alarm fire here even brought a response from one of FDNY's fire boats.
All of the flooding and fire just added drama to the conversion of this property. The buildings were slated to be demolished regardless.
Mere hours after the fire was out, we arrived. We didn't know there had been a fire, but were not terribly surprised with all of the destruction that unfolded post-Hurricane Sandy. Myself and ntwrkguy made the trip, evading Fresh Direct's rent-a-cop security in order to gain access. Once on the property everything was a breeze.
The most interesting part was the office building. The fire had been confined to the 2nd building, leaving the offices 99% untouched (thanks FDNY). Many of the companies that rented space here left a ton of stuff behind. The best of the lot was the construction company that left behind tons of blueprints for various jobs. Who doesn't love staring at blueprints?
Future
Shocking but true, these buildings have now been demolished to make way for a freight yard. The LIRR has been keen on getting their tenant freight railroad - the New York and Atlantic (NY&A)- out of the nearby 'arch street' yard - which they can use as part of their East Side Access project (they already took over most of Arch Street to build a new shop building). In building a new yard for the NY&A at the old wheelspur yard, the LIRR can trade and get the rest of Arch street. The NY&A, on the other hand, now gets a similar sized property to maintain their existing customers, and the advantage of a transload yard on Newtown creek, enabling potential direct maritime-to-rail transfer. For the first time since the early 1980's there will be freight customers on the track west of the dutch kills creek drawbridge.
This won't be the first time since the 80's that a freight train has come across the drawbridge. Just this last summer (2012), the NY&A used it to park freight cars in the newly rebuilt Blissville yard (the cars have to be backed in from over the bridge).
While it's sad to see the equally old yard at Arch Street taken out of freight service, it's a definitely plus that Wheelspur is being used for it's replacement. NYC is currently (and rather severely) under-served by freight rail. The cost of delivering goods to NYC via truck drives up consumer prices for everything - from lumber to Chinese food. Overall, I'd give this land-reuse a thumbs up for smart urban planning. L.I.C. needs the jobs preservation that comes with it - not another batch of overpriced, under-sized condos.
(thanks to Arrrrt's archive for much of the history info above - as well as the older historic photos)
RC Factory, Miami
By: Control , Posted on March 5, 2013
I think this is the first abandoned building I've been to that has
a Yelp review page..
Graffiti History
According to yelp:
*Early 1990s: The words "Yammy, Yammy, Miami" are displayed on one of the walls
*1995 through 1998: All illegal pieces
*1999: Illegal blockbuster done by graffiti legends Crook and Crome (Crook and Crome are two of Miami's most infamous graffiti writers. During the height of the controversy surrounding these two artists, they executed an enormous blockbuster on this wall during the daytime.)
*2000-2001: Lebo painted the wall and was dissed by Miami graffiti writers. (Lebo Lebatard is a Miami artist with a fantastic career. He is known for painting a lot of music-inspired works of art and is the brother of the sports writer and radio host Dan Lebatard. The reason it got dissed is because the wall belonged to Miami Graffiti writers, and Lebo painted over their works. Though he is a respected artist, he's not a street artist. It probably wasn't intentional, but that's what happened.)
*2002: Meks, Aim Crew, Freek, Ultra, Gwiz, Dam Crew, Cure, Msix, Bane, MSG, and the inkheads painted a mural for use in the movie 2 Fast 2 Furious.
*2005 (est.): Altoids uses local graffiti artists to create a writer's album for promotional purposes.
*2008 - Present: Primary Flight takes over the plant with permission from its current owners.
Industrial History
This building was formerly used by RC Cola. It's exact history beyond that is unknown. If you happen to know more than we do - by all means please comment. The internet is decidedly vacant of information on this subject.
Legal?
We heard a story that a pretty well known Miami writer was in there painting illegally when cops showed up - they were going to kick his ass but his girl was there and they didn't pull a dick card. Like all graffiti stories take it with a grain of salt. We climbed in and had no problems walking around in there - not during Art Basel or with any sort of permission.
So by all means, go in and enjoy. And like any location, expect that there is always the slim chance a cop might show up.
Smith’s Dungeon
By: malibu361 , Posted on February 18, 2013
Smith's Dungeon is perhaps one of the hardest NYC Subway tunnel locations to crack open. Leave it to one of our newest members to crack open a spot that has eluded more explorers and graffiti artists than a hand full of Sonia Vergara's massive tits.
2nd Ave Subway Station Construction
By: Control , Posted on February 4, 2013
The NYC MTA is undertaking a massive
cash-toss project to extend a subway tunnel under 2nd Avenue on the Upper East Side. This project was originally proposed in the 1920's. A few small sections of it was built in the 70s, though nothing came of this project until the last 10 years. Today, actual construction is underway.
Part of this construction includes the rebuilding and installation of machinery within the one half-station which already exists for this new subway route. What's curious though is the size and scope of the work being performed here. What was a complete entrance/exit was completely gutted - with huge amounts of flooring and ironwork removed in order to accommodate... what? I'm sure an answer to this question is freely available, buried in MTA planning documents - but it seems like such a waste.
Well, waste or not, I ought not complain. For I love the NYC Underground, and a day spent poking around a huge underground construction site as vast as this one is never a waste for me.
Behind Grand Central Terminal’s Massive Tiffany Clock
By: Control , Posted on January 31, 2013
Since today marks the 100th anniversary of the opening of
Grand Central Terminal, I thought it might be nice to take you to a part of the station that is rarely seen by the public at large: Inside the massive clock overlooking 42nd street and Park Avenue South. This is the largest Tiffany clock in the world. Measuring 14 feet in diameter and constructed of stained glass, It is a priceless one of a kind gem.
Getting In
Accessing the space behind the clock is basically impossible. You either need to know someone that works here or be a master of disguise. It is only accessible via a ladder, which is located in the back of a closet of one of the most heavily secured rooms in NYC. There are literally dozens of cameras lining the hallways leading to this portion of the station, along with special keys, access cards, and the occasional roving MTA police patrols complete with k9s and the occasionally automatic rifles. I rate the average person's chances of getting into this room at around .01 (slightly above zero, and well into the 'you'll go to jail if you try' range.
So how did you get in?
One of the two options listed above. Or maybe we flat out got in there nearly a decade ago when there was no security and simply never posted photos of it until now.
The truth is, my soon to be wife got me in there - making her significantly more badass than even I am.
What's in there?
Not really anything. There's a short series of ladders that brings you up into a confined space directly behind the clock. There's a few tags on the walls, some decades old. The only noise comes from 42nd street down below. The old well oiled clock is silent in it's work. Like time itself, and this post, there is nothing else to say.
Under Their Fuckin’ Noses.
By: Caveman , Posted on January 22, 2013
