Home Asides An end in sight for Second Ave. muckhouses

An end in sight for Second Ave. muckhouses

by Benjamin Kabak

For over two years, multi-story structures along Second Ave. called muck houses have protected Upper East Side buildings and residents from exposure to substantial dirt and debris from subway construction. Now, with work moving ahead slowly but surely, the MTA has unveiled a timeline for the removal of these structures, according to today’s amNew York.

According to the article, the 72nd St. muckhouse will be dismantled by the end of August with the 69th St. structure to follow later this fall. The same structures at 86th St. will disappear next summer. Those are already two stories shorter as the MTA’s experiences at 72nd St. allowed them to build more efficiently at 86th. If anything, this institutional memory and learning process is another argument for continuing subway construction underneath Second Ave. long before SAS Phase 1 wraps in 2016.

While some Upper East Siders complain in the article about these structures’ effects on traffic, others have begrudgingly accepted them. “If a New Yorker cannot tolerate something as simple as this, they’re not a New Yorker,” James Kiss said. “We want progress, we expect progress.” Progress — in the form of a new subway line — cannot arrive soon enough.

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17 comments

asar June 10, 2013 - 3:13 pm

People should move if the construction bothers them. Although, it’s not that easy. If u want more transportation in the area, you’ll have2deal with the construction. Its like what happened with construction after hurricane sandy, residents of brighton beach and coney island were pissed as fuck with the construction noise

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John-2 June 10, 2013 - 3:45 pm

Second Avenue Muckhouse would have been a great name for a dive bar in the East Village back in the 1960s.

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tjdunleavy June 10, 2013 - 4:23 pm

Yes, Institutional Memory is hard to gain and quick to loose. Best not to allow it to fade away, again.

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al June 11, 2013 - 1:50 pm

I wonder how much of the cost overruns of the Archer Ave extension and 63rd st line was an attempt to keep all those construction management, contractors and engineers with 50’s and 60’s era subway construction experience employed. They might had become used to the overstaffing and then demanded it stay that way when all these projects started in the early 2000’s with the ESA.

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al June 11, 2013 - 1:53 pm

Today we have a growing number of tools to capture institutional knowledge. It sometimes involves pairing a nice young woman with an old guy about to retire and have him spill his guts about all his past experiences (good and bad).

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BBnet3000 June 10, 2013 - 5:42 pm

The only people i feel bad for are the business owners behind the muckhouses, though the MTA has done a fairly admirable job of advertising them and keeping them accessible. If they make it through construction, they have boom years ahead when the subway opens.

As far as construction noise, thats pretty much a fact of life in New York. Its jackhammer season, after all.

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BoerumBum June 11, 2013 - 9:19 am

Agreed – I’ve seen too many of them fail over the past few years, from mom & pop stores, to restaurants, to (just recently) the Food Emporium on 86th & 2nd (though I’m sure the opening of a Fairway on 86th was a contributing factor for that one). I’m sure they’re as excited by the prospect of being seen from the street again as we all are for the beginning of revenue service on the SAS.

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Benjamin Kabak June 11, 2013 - 9:21 am

The Food Emporium didn’t fail because of SAS; it was closed because of it. The space is housing subway infrastructure. That was announced in early planning docs in the mid-2000s.

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BoerumBum June 11, 2013 - 9:31 am

News to me. Thanks, Ben – interesting info!

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D in Bushwick June 10, 2013 - 6:24 pm

Anyone know where all the crushed rock went?
When I’ve asked this before here, all I got were flip answers since the expert repliers, shockingly, didn’t know.

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Benjamin Kabak June 10, 2013 - 6:25 pm

WNYC had a story on rock removal in August of 2011. It sells but not for much.

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SEAN June 10, 2013 - 8:31 pm

Oh, rock bottom prices?

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D in Bushwick June 10, 2013 - 10:04 pm

Who’d a thought?
Thank you!

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AG June 11, 2013 - 9:32 am

My guess would be landfill…. just as dredging material usually goes to beaches and such… not much has probably changed. I knew a guy who used to hall a lot of the excavated building sites in Manhattan out to Jersey decades ago. He can point to you a lot of the housing developments in Jersey that were built on what was swampy land.
Can’t say for certain though… but it’s the highest probability.

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Chris C June 11, 2013 - 11:55 am

The spoil from building the Lex Avenue subway was used to expand Governors Island – increasing it in size by about 1/3rd.

I guess with the spoil from ESA (and to a lesser extent the 7 extension) there is a lot of it about at the same time which is probably depressing the price of it.

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Jerrold June 10, 2013 - 9:27 pm

Ben, does that mean that you accept the 2016 date as still realistic?
I mean, maybe IT IS.
I just wanted your opinion.

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Bahar June 11, 2013 - 7:47 am

Anyone know if the W will be back come Dec 2016 ?

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