Nathan Kensinger Photography: 11/1/09

November 30th, 2009 -

Sunset Park is Brooklyn's last stronghold of waterfront industry. Stretched out along approximately 50 blocks, its industrial zone houses numerous small businesses and four major industrial complexes - Industry City, the Brooklyn Army Terminal, Bush Terminal and the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal. According to the Southwest Brooklyn Industrial Development Corp, "over 20,000 people are employed by Sunset Park's manufacturing and industrial sectors."

Today, the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal is being redeveloped by its operator, the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC). This 88 acre industrial complex has been underutilized for several years, with empty warehouses, abandoned offices and rotting locker rooms. Some of these spaces are now being demolished as part of the NYCEDC's Sunset Park Vision Plan. This plan, which also encompasses the $36 million park at Bush Terminal, promises to "strengthen the area as a center for industrial growth" with $40 million earmarked for "creating rail infrastructure and a new public berth" and a "$48 million investment to rehabilitate docks" at the terminal. After these improvements are complete, the terminal will be home to the Axis Group - an "auto-processing company" and Sims Recycling - "a modern recycling center."

Hopefully the NYEDC Vision Plan will help retain Sunset Park's working waterfront for many decades to come.

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For more photo essays from Brooklyn's Sunset Park please visit Bush Terminal (2007), the Brooklyn Army Terminal (2008), Empire Electric (2009), S & S Machinery (2010) and the 68th Police Precinct (2011).

Warehouse Demolition

Bulkhead Repairs

No Berthing

Restricted Area

Terminal Diagonals

Anne Frank (2008)

Green Tree

Inside Out

Warehouse Interior

Pull Box

"Our Number 1 Pollution: Communism"

"Life is Always Special"

November 11th, 2009 -

The Fresh Kills Landfill was once the largest landfill in the world. Situated on the west coast of Staten Island, it could "be seen with the naked eye from space" and was "taller then the Statue of Liberty" according to a study from Brooklyn College, while Wikipedia claims it may have been "the largest man-made structure on Earth." The landfill opened in 1948, according to The Department of Parks & Recreation, and grew by "29,000 tons of trash per day" at its peak, swelling to "approximately 150 million tons of solid waste" before closing down in 2001. Its 2,200 acres are now part of an extremely ambitious 30-year-plan to turn this dump into "the largest park developed in New York City in over 100 years."

Despite this epic history, Fresh Kills is now a rather quiet and serene site. Its landscape has more in common with a western prairie then with Staten Island's heavily forested hills. Low scrub brush, a few scattered trees and winding dirt roads look out on Fresh Kills itself, which is a peaceful freshwater stream meandering between man-made hills. Deer and osprey have made this their home.

Unlike the breached landfill of Dead Horse Bay, there is no garbage visible at the Fresh Kills site. Most of its trash mounds have been capped. However, as the eye becomes accustomed to the vast, seemingly empty landscape, it begins to pick out anomalous details. A complex system of passive vents, gas extraction wells and flare stations dot the hills. Designed to harvest or burn off the noxious gasses building up beneath the landfill's shell, they are a constant reminder of the area's hidden toxicity. If not for these reminders of the man-made origins of this unnatural wasteland, Fresh Kills would be a beautiful estuary.

No section of Fresh Kills Park will be open to the public before 2010, although occasional bus tours are sometimes offered by the parks department.

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Note: These photographs were taken at the invitation of the New York City Parks and Recreation Department. They were subsequently presented at two lectures sponsored by the Parks & Rec Department. The first, at the Metropolitan Exchange, was titled "Picturing New York City's Post-Industrial Waterfont" and the second, co-sponsored by The Council on the Arts and Humanities for Staten Island, was titled "The Post-Industrial Shores of Staten Island."