Newkirk Avenue

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Newkirk Plaza
Newkirk Plaza

This afternoon, Blog Widow and I had brunch at Picket Fence on Cortelyou Road, then strolled through Ditmas Park and Ditmas Park West. Yes, yes, there are beautiful houses there. But today it’s about Newkirk Avenue.

Watching You
Watching You, Newkirk Avenue and East 16th Street
A half-block from the Newkirk Avenue subway station is this imposing array of surveillance cameras. I’m sure I’m recorded somewhere now, and facial recognition systems will soon match this suspicious character to my 25-year old blog profile photo, my identity revealed.

Christ My Sufficiency
Christ My Sufficiency, Brooklyn Foursquare Church, 603 Rugby Road
This is just south of Newkirk Avenue on Rugby Road. The sign caught my eye, as well as Blog Widow’s. He said I had to take a picture of this store-front church. He’s in the biz, so I assume it’s out of professional interest.

Of course, I had to ask him, “What’s a FourSquare Church?” It was founded by Aimee Semple McPherson in 1927. Which doesn’t explain anything to me. I’ll read the Wikipedia article later.

Markets and Grocery Stores
Kim's Market, 1521 Newkirk Avenue, Ditmas Park
SSC Market, 4 Newkirk Plaza
Rupali Grocery, 1408 Newkirk Avenue

MYSTERY SOLVED! Bitter Melon on Newkirk Avenue
Mystery produce, Newkirk Avenue
Frank Jump, neighbor and general cohort, identifies these objets as bitter melons. It looks like a hairy, warty cucumber. It just doesn’t say “Eat ME!” to me.

Two Guys
Two Guys, Newkirk Avenue
I was taking a photo of the Drupali Grocery on Newkirk Avenue when these guys told me to "Make it a good picture!"

Each said I should take a picture of the other guy. So I asked to take a shot of both of them together. This was the third and last photo, after I prompted them to "smile!"

Welcome in Eleven Languages
Welcome in Eleven Languages
This is the sign on the corner of the Newkirk Family Health Center, at the northeast corner of Newkirk and Rugby Road.

I don’t even recognize half of the alphabets, let alone the languages.
The first four are English, Spanish, Russian and French. I recognize Hebrew second from the bottom. I think the bottom one is Arabic script, and fourth from the bottom are Chinese characters.

Seeking bulb-planting volunteers for November weekends

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Planting bulbs from the Daffodil Project in my front garden, Fall 2006
Planting bulbs from the Daffodil Project in my front garden, Fall 2006

Thanks to the initiative of one of my neighbors, Stacey, in Beverley Square West, there will be 300-500 daffodil bulbs available for planting on the grounds of P.S. 139 along Rugby Road, and in the new tree pits along Cortelyou Road.

The bulbs will arrive at the end of October, in time for November planting. Stacey and I thought we would try to coordinate some plantings the first and second weekends in November. Stacey will be at the Greenmarket TOMORROW, October 14, from 10am to 12noon, tabling with free 9-volt batteries for smoke detectors. If you can stop by, you can sign up for one or more days. If not, you can “vote” in the poll at the top of the sidebar on this blog to let us know which day(s) you could help out.

Related Posts:

Changes on Cortelyou Road, March 2007
The Daffodil Project, November 2006

Flatbush Viewed from Afar

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It’s an odd feeling, to see yourself – or my neighborhood, in this case – described by a stranger. In today’s edition of the English-language Malaysian newspaper The Star, their “State Side” columnist Foo Yee Ping takes a look at Flatbush.

Kosher meat is widely available. One tour agency arranges for travel on Emirates, Etihad, Kuwait, Qatar and Gulf airlines.

There is a mosque, too. And there is a “yeshivah” (Orthodox Jewish school), just a five-minute walk away.

Nearby, a sign outside a barbershop proclaims: “We speak English, Russian, Urdu and Yiddish.”

Welcome to Flatbush, a neighbourhood in Brooklyn presenting a New York City seldom seen on celluloid.

– No clash of cultures here, State Side with Foo Yee Ping

From my home here in far Western Flatbush, I hear both sabbath sirens and muezzin’s calls to prayers. But they’re coming from our neighbors in Kensington.

One of those interviewed in the article is Mohammad Razvi, who was one of the dozen or so candidates for our City Council seat earlier this year.

Native Plant Swap TODAY in East Willamsburg

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Today, Friday, October 12, from 3-7pm, the Butterfly Project of the Wildlife Conservation Society (NYC Zoos) is sponsoring a native plant share at the Heckscher Foundation Children’s Garden (Willamsburg Community Garden), 134-136 Scholes Street, across the street from the Martinez Playground, between Manhattan and Graham Avenues in East Willamsburg, Brooklyn.

Join the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Butterfly Project to receive plants and information on how to start a butterfly garden.
Note: All plants available are for planting in public spaces.
[emphasis added]

Closest subway stop is Montrose Avenue on the L train.

For more information: (845) 531-9745

Note: OASIS’ mapping system identifies the area as “East Williamsburg”. I don’t know the area, and I welcome any corrections for the name of the neighborhood!

Links
Butterfly Project
Willamsburg Community Garden

We Are All One World

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NASA images by Reto Stöckli, based on data.
The Earth, Side B

Spectacular composite images from NASA. If you have the bandwidth, definitely check out the full size renditions (Eastern hemisphere, and my home, the Western hemisphere), each of which is nearly 3MB in size. You’ll feel like you’re floating in space over the earth.

These are not photographs. These are carefully constructed from large databases of images taken at many different times and places.

Drawing on data from multiple satellite missions (not all collected at the same time), a team of NASA scientists and graphic artists created layers of global data for everything from the land surface, to polar sea ice, to the light reflected by the chlorophyll in the billions of microscopic plants that grow in the ocean. They wrapped these layers around a globe, set it against a black background, and simulated the hazy edge of the Earth’s atmosphere (the limb) that appears in astronaut photography of the Earth.
…
Most of the data layers in this visualization are available as monthly composites as part of NASA’s Blue Marble Next Generation image collection. The images in the collection appear in cylindrical projection (rectangular maps), and they are available at 500-meter resolution. The large images provided above are the full-size versions of these globes. In their hope that these images will inspire people to appreciate the beauty of our home planet and to learn about the Earth system, the developers of these images encourage readers to re-use and re-publish the images freely.

– Twin Blue Marbles, NASA Earth Observatory


Links

Blue Marble: Next Generation

Carolina Silverbell: One of a Million

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Just the thought of Mike Bloomberg and Bette Midler together makes me giddy.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and New York Restoration Project (NYRP) Founder Bette Midler today launched the Million Trees NYC initiative to plant and care for one million trees throughout the five boroughs in the next decade. The Mayor and Ms. Midler planted a street tree in the Morrisania section of the Bronx – a neighborhood with too few trees and high rates of asthma – and declared the Carolina Silverbell to be the first of one million trees.
– Press release, Tuesday, October 9, 2007

And if not for the much-needed rain tonight, we could see that the Empire State Building is lit green to note today’s kickoff.

Not once do they mention the botanical name of the tree, Halesia carolina. It’s a lovely, graceful tree. I don’t know how it fares as a street tree in NYC. It’s native to the southeastern United States. It’s in the Styracaceae, the Storax or Snowball family.

The nomenclature for this genus seems confused. Wikipedia lists H. carolina as a synonym for H. tetraptera, but the USDA Plants database identifies the latter as a different species, the mountain silverbell, with two subspecies. I’ll defer to USDA Plants as the authority.

None of the four species of Halesia are native to New York state. According to the Atlas of the New York Flora Association, both H. carolina and H. tetraptera are known as escapes in the wild.

The Parks Department will receive nearly $400 million over the next ten years to plant 600,000 public trees by reforesting 2,000 acres of existing parkland and lining New York City streets with trees. The City’s partners, including non-profit and community organizations, businesses, developers and everyday New Yorkers will plant the remaining 400,000 trees.

There are many ways to get involved in Million Trees NYC:

  • plant a tree in your yard;
  • join a volunteer group planting trees in parks and on public land;
  • request that the City plant street trees on your block;
  • learn how to water, mulch, and prune trees;
  • educate other New Yorkers on the importance of our urban forest; and
  • become an advocate for planting trees.

Each request for a street tree will trigger an evaluation of the suggested site by a Parks department inspector. Considerations such as electrical wires, underground utilities, light posts and building entrances will be part of the inspection. If it is possible to plant a tree in the site requested, a tree planting contractor will be assigned to plant the tree in the next possible planting season, in either the spring or fall.

Links

Halesia carolina (USDA Plants Database)
Million Trees NYC Web site (also in the sidebar under Links > NYC)
New York Restoration Project (Bette Midler’s joint, also in the sidebar)

Related Posts

April 22: 1M Trees in 10 Years

A Weekend in the Garden

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A fallen leaf from the cherry tree in the backyard
Cherry Leaf
Some macro shots of what’s happening in the garden now. Most of the shots are from the backyard, some from the sideyard, along the driveway.

I was really surprised to have this Cicada fly right past me and land on the fence long enough for me to get a good shot of it. I’ve never see a live one so close up. I usually see them dead on the sidewalk, often missing their abdomen from predation. In that state, the markings on the top of the thorax (?) are dull dark brown and black. I think this is Tibicen canicularis, the dog-day cicada.
Cicada

I’ve been watching the aphids on these milkweed stems for several weeks. This photo doesn’t capture the intense orange-yellow color of these bugs; they look more yellow in the photo than they actually are. I wonder if their color is caused by feeding on milkweed, much like the warning red-orange colors of Monarchs?
Aphids on Milkweed

Berries of Pokeweed, Phytolacca americana
Pokeweed Berries

Berries of Winterberry, Ilex verticillata
Winterberries

Sweet Autumn Clematis
Sweet Autumn Clematis

Sunflower
Sunflower

Susan Siegel Resigning as E.D. of FDC

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Susan Siegel, Executive Director of the Flatbush Development Corporation (FDC), announced today that she is resigning from her position, effective November 15:

… after three wonderful years serving as the Executive Director of Flatbush Development Corporation I have decided that it’s time for a change. Resigning was a difficult decision for me because I love my neighborhood and our mission. The past three years have literally flown by because of all the remarkable challenges and opportunities that we have met together. It has been an honor and privilege to grow and evolve with FDC every step of the way.
– via FDC Online Yahoo group (moderated, membership required)

For those who don’t know FDC, it’s an important neighborhood institution. In addition to sponsoring the well-known and popular annual Flatbush Frolic and Victorian Flatbush House (and sometimes Garden) Tour, they also organize housing workshops and programs for Flatbush’ large immigrant communities, such as ESL financial literacy. They’re involved in economic/commercial development efforts, such as the recent streetscaping of Cortelyou Road. They also administer several message forums, extending our physical neighborhoods to online communities.

Links

Flatbush Development Corporation

State of Flatbush/Midwood

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The Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported yesterday that this report was “just released”, although it was released back in April [PDF]. Nevertheless, the State of New York City’s Housing and Neighborhoods 2006 report, from NYU’s Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy, is worth a second look (or first look if, like me, you somehow missed the full report the first time).

In addition to statistics and trends by borough, they include the details and rankings by Community District. Most of Victorian Flatbush lies in the northern half of CD14, which covered Flatbush and Midwood:

Flatbush/Midwood tops the citywide rankings in price appreciation and median price per unit for single-family homes. Median incomes have been trending upward, poverty has declined by 3 percentage points and overall income disparities in the district have decreased. CD 214 is Brooklyn’s most racially diverse district and almost 60% of its households are immigrant-headed. CD 214 is the borough’s second densest district and has a very low proportion of open space or vacant land compared to the rest of the borough. The housing stock in CD 214 is in worse shape than average—serious housing code violations are high, and although a high percentage is rent-regulated, little subsidized housing is available.
– State of NYC’s Housing and Neighborhoods 2006, Brooklyn Community District 14, Flatbush/Midwood [PDF]

At just .77 acres of open space per 1,000 residents [PDF], CD14 ranks 47th out of 59 Community Districts. Worst off across the whole city is East Flatbush (Brooklyn CD17), with just .11 acres for 1,000 residents.

Generated with NYCHANIS.
Open Space by Community District, NYC

The Web site for the report has a complete index of reports by Community District.

Links:

State of New York City’s Housing and Neighborhoods 2006
The Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy
New York City Housing and Neighborhood Information System (Requires free registration)

Comment Moderation Temporarily Enabled

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Update 2007.10.13: Hydroponics spam continues. Comments remain moderated. Permanently, I suspect.
Update 2007.10.10: Today it’s hydroponics spam. Comments remain moderated.

Due to Costa Rican spammers (you don’t want to know), I have to temporarily enable comment moderation for the blog. In compensation, I’ve also temporarily turned off word verification (CAPTCHA) for new comments.

They’re following the usual spammer pattern: they target posts that are at least a year old, put in some boiler-plate text about “how wonderful your blog is”, followed by a link to the spam site. Easily recognizable, but a pain in the @$$.

We’ll see how long this takes to settle down …