So its the first gorgeous Saturday of spring, I'm doing my usual run, Dia is packed, there's 20 cars parked at Madam Brett, crowds of hikers and fishermen are to and from Dennings Point... and 3 teenagers are breaking into Beacon Terminal Associates, the old hat factory, right through the front door at 2:30 PM.
The door is locked, but the trick they are using is easy (obviously I'm not going into details on a public website). Who manages Beacon Terminal Associates? The City of Beacon?
Look, this is how we lost the massive, imposing Tuck Tape factory, aka, the New York Rubber mill, see bottom:
http://www.hudsonvalleyruins.org/alert/2006.html
That place could have easily have found reuse. This is also how we lost Bannerman's Island back in the '70s: teenaged firebugs. 95% of the the time they are harmless teenagers gawking. 5% of the time they are intending mischief. 1% of the time they destroy the whole place, forever. So nip it in the bud before it gets out of hand. If these places aren't secured, we lose them. Yeah sure, Beacon Terminal Associates is a pretty run down junky place right now, but so was the Roundhouse once. So was the old Nabisco factory once. These old properties have lovely bones. If we lose Beacon Terminal Associates to fire, its like we're losing a future Dia.
So please, whoever manages Beacon Terminal Associates, secure the front door. Actually... yes, the door is already locked. PM me for details of how they are breaking in.
Views: 1662
Tags: bannerman's island, beacon terminal associates, dia, roundhouse, security, tuck tape factory
Comment
atticus:
as bud/ cv suggested, there's also the issue of access below madam brett park. there's the tiny shaft under the railroad tracks, and there is the tioronda bridge. the bridge is dismantled, so they'd have to rebuild the bridge. i hope they really do rebuild the bridge, no matter what, but not as some stupid carport access road. but for walking/ biking and preserving its historic nature (see john fasulo's post about this tragedy: http://www.beaconcitizen.com/profiles/blogs/bow-string-truss-sectio...)
or: widen the passage under the railroad tracks. expensive. and you still would have the problem that no moving vans could get in because of height (are they going to lift the tracks too?)
99% of people reading this comment can't do right by the beacon hat factory, they can only comment helplessly like me. but for those 1% reading this with enough power/ influence/ money, this is what you do with the old hat factory:
a college campus
you buy craig house property (whose current investment banker owner uses it as a warehouse for his art. whoop-de-doo, he can be persuaded to accept a buy out), you get someone like nyu to partner with you to make it a satellite campus. ny state chips in with the university settlement property across 9D because you make the college focus on the arts and the environment (scenic hudson and clearwater would welcome this, because they'd be part of the effort, not shoved aside). you'd have a scenic, charming campus
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7652577@N05/2593835420/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7652577@N05/2593833530/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/neversaydie/290196669/
somebody with money or power reading this: dia was made from our industrial heritage. the roundhouse as well. beacon is being reborn from its old pieces and here's your chance to make your mark with another piece of our industrial heritage in the best way
CV: Thank you for the info. And I congratulate the Ehrlichs on their shrewd investments.
However, I thought the condos are going in above Madam Brett park not below. I could be wrong. I also think the old hat factory is structurally sound and worth saving and deserves to be reborn as a new institution, not condos, which would be a shame, in my mind.
And frankly, I just don't see it happening because its in the middle of a park and its not a very big parcel. I don't think planners and developers are that myopic as to not see its just not a good residential area. Who wants strangers trespassing across their residences all day? That's obviously what would happen. Is a residential development in the middle of Memorial Park a good idea? Same level of silliness. I just don't see that happening. Developers can't be that daft, can they?
atticus:
http://geoaccess.co.dutchess.ny.us/parcelaccess/parcelaccess_map.htm
Beacon Terminal Associates is owned by... Beacon Terminal Associates
and Beacon Terminal Associates mailing address is 18 E 22nd St New York NY
naturally
lawyer's maildrop?
Dan:
How did the Tuck Tape factory building burn down in 2005?
How did Bannerman's Island burn down in 1969?
You have to aware of the simple fact that old unoccupied structures are vulnerable to fires. Some natural, some not. While you ask me to imagine what it is like for teenage lives, I'd like you to imagine what it is like for future lives without the ability to enjoy these industrial remnants at all. I share you and your dad's romanticism for rambling through the past, and I don't understand why you view my impulses for preservation as an enemy of that romanticism, rather than the direct product of it.
You seem not to be aware of the threat these places exist under from illicit use. I'd ask for you to consider that, in the name of the enjoyment that you have written about, not in spite of it. These teenagers may share your wonder, but they don't necessarily share your benign appreciation.
"Do something about it instead."
I did. I confronted the teenagers at the time of the break in.
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