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Sunnyside Photo Gallery: Queens Blvd |
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| Looking south down Van Dam Street. This intersection may never have gotten notoriety for pedestrian trauma, since even the most irresponsible walkers seem to have the sense to avoid testing fate here. This location has quite even notoriety as a motorist hell as it is. One local radio news reporter refers to it as Van Damn-it when giving traffic reports. He uses the term so casually at this point, that I doubt he is even consciously aware of what he's saying, and DAMN IT, Van Damn-it, few drivers love you, for when rush hour arrives, this quickly turns into the Rocky Horror Traffic Jam. Most of the trouble stems from Van Dam's unfortunate position as the last Long Island Expressway exit before the Midtown tunnel. All the cheapskates that don't cotton to paying the tunnel's toll into Manhattan jump the expressway there and tootle up the several blocks north to turn here, as is the fire engine, onto westbound Queens Boulevard, heading for the free 59th Street Bridge, and no amount of life eating nightmare traffic hell seems adequate to dissuade them. |
©2001, Jeff Saltzman. All right reserved.
