LIC Cement Tower

Published on: April 9th, 2020 | Written by: Bad Guy Joe

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Christmas morning climbing to build mind and character 😛

Adventure Time:
A few years back I spotted a tower I wanted to climb, if only because it was just so ridiculously accessible and would offer me some unique photo angle of other nearby spots I had documented here over the years. This property is located on a pizza-slice shaped lot, wedged between the pepperoni crust that is the Montauk Cutoff, the M-Cabin drawbridge, and the Borden Avenue ‘slide’ drawbridge across the Dutch Kills (waterway).

At the time, this property featured a tiny cement plant. Those of you very familiar with the industry here in NYC will know what company owned it and my own connection to this ratified family owned heavily Italian American world of ready mix. Unlike the Certified Concrete locations and the former Ferrera Brothers gowanus canal location (where we hosted a party) that I’ve documented, this location wasn’t abandoned, so I’m leaving i’s name and unique history out of this.

Access was super straightforward: simply walk into the lot from the Montauk Cutoff tracks. No fences, no ‘no trespass’ signage that would have made wandering in a ‘violation’. Timing, however, was tricky: the NYC ready mix industry runs all day and night, practically 365 days a year. To get up this tower, I’d have to go early on a holiday. Thus, one Christmas morning, I ventured on over.

Sure, I probably could have went on a normal business day and chatted up some people on the lot and gotten permission to do this, but it’s just not my furbizia style. If I can do my benevolent thing without anyone being the wiser for awhile, I’m content.

The results are pretty straightforward: I went up the tower, got a few quick photos, and left. What you’re looking at here are some angles that quite literally can’t be taken again. The tower left with the rest of the cement plant, sometime around 2018 if I recall right. They had simply outgrown this crammed little lot.

Post-Mortem
Today some Brooklyn based company has rented out the small buildings on the lot. A friend of mine actually looked into renting this property out, only to be quoted a completely ridiculous price compared to his other holdings. Much of the lot remained empty until the Covid-19 virus outbreak, when it was filled with Lyft taxis being temporarily stored. If Lyft, or whoever owns all these cars, are paying even close to the rate my friend was quoted, they are bleeding a huge amount of money. Not that I really care if some huge tech firm with questionable labor practices loses money, but still…

Comments

NOTE: It sometimes takes a short while for comments to be approved - unfortunately there's a lot of spam comments that come in. I absolutely love when y'all share personal stories of friends relatives etc who worked in these places. It really helps capture what these places were like before they closed up shop.

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