First, you plant some hedges around it. But that just isn't good enough. What's better is a rolling, green, suburban-style lawn with a white fence around it.
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B.H. Grossman sent in these shots of the Lukoil station on 10th Avenue and High Line, slated to become "an art-themed, mixed-use condo and retail development" by Michael Shvo.
The texting preppie on the Citibike just brings it all together, like some fever dream of a futuristic Mayberry, U.S.A.
Update: Our friend Tricia writes, she was walking by and: "A retired cop dressed like a museum guard explained it was going to have sculptures of sheep on the 17th, for a month." Sheep!
The final photo says it all.
ReplyDeleteThe new and improved New York. If only it was Mayberry, which at least had some charm, as well as hokey but interesting characters. The new and improved New York has neither charm nor interesting characters, only SWPL office drones texting from a Citibike while anxiously awaiting the completion of another stunning glass phallus.
I must finally admit that the home I've always known had been taken over by rich, texting zombies.
ReplyDeleteI feel badly for that mom and pop oil purveyor that got gentrified. Are Mr. and Mrs. Luk doing okay?
ReplyDeleteI passed by here this morning and someone was watering the lawn.
ReplyDeleteOh no!
ReplyDeleteAn ugly gas station that attracted thousands of exhaust-coughing cars a day has been replaced by something visually interesting--and green, to boot!
How I miss the old days.
This ..... disturbs me greatly. I'm not gonna throw out any 'Now back in my day ....' statements, because nobody wants to hear them. But I'll post this in morbid celebration of a New York that will never see a C.H.U.D. again.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/Q9PjGXP0iC8
"Art-themed," what the hell does that mean? Will likely be all about entertainment and facade, nothing about intellect and culture. Why not just legalize gambling and make everything a Las Vegas-like NYC simulacrum where developers don't even have to pretend to offer something tangible in return for money?
ReplyDeletePlease can we stop with the tired anti car rhetoric? This is a city, where people use vehicles for myriad reasons. People who work here, deliver things here, people who don't live within biking range or even convenient transit, so please STFU already.
ReplyDeleteSheep! That's perfect.
ReplyDeleteYeah sheep, and a sculpture of Christine Quinn dressed up as a shepherdess like Marie Antoinette at Versailles.
ReplyDeleteA Vampire Marie Antionnette..."let them eat the heart out of this city"
ReplyDeletejeremiah, im not w/you on this one. the more grass in NYC the better. would you prefer piles of cement, or just trash untill they build? the gas station is gone. i hate the fumes of gas anyway. the idea of "sheep" is nice, whats wrong? better then billboards. i love animal shapes. (i dont like the suburan approach either. yes i woud rather have a japanese or botanical garden). @ least they are trying to make a nice envirement untill the condo goes up!
ReplyDeleteThere once were sheep in Central Park...they were "gentrified" by the nouveau riche who moved on its edges. Hence the Sheep's Meadow. Just a random bit of trivia.
ReplyDelete@ Little Earthquake, before Central Park was laid out portions of it were a thriving African-American neighborhood that was "gentrified" into oblivion, so that, yes, a park could be built to provide green space for the growing city. And on that green space did dwell sheep and other farm animals. Those African Americans, not so much.
ReplyDeleteBTW, are those play sheep on the Lukoil Meadow, or rats?
The sheep were free grass cutters. In the Val Lewton film "Cat People" (1942) Simone Simon turns into a panther and stalks Jane Randolph in Central Park. Later on, a park sheep caretaker finds a dead sheep. But in reality the sheep were removed from Central Park and sent to Prospect Park Brooklyn in 1934. A few months ago sheep were introduced into public parks in Paris as "living lawn motors."
ReplyDelete