Lincoln Tunnel Land Ventilation Tower, 491 11th Ave, NYC, 2025.
All the pixels, none of the traffic, at https://www.flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/54365775629
#photography
Rodenstock HR Digaron-W 32mm/4.0 lens (@ f/7.1), Phase One IQ4-150 back (@ ISO 64), Cambo WRS 1250 camera, shifted vertically -5mm, horizontally -15mm. Cropped a bit.
This humble and functional, yet handsome, art deco structure is the easternmost of three ventilation towers for the Lincoln Tunnel and was completed with its first tube in 1937. The facade was refurbished about ten years ago. It also hosts a large array of cellular telephone base station antennas.
The Lincoln Tunnel, opened in 1937, is a multi-tube automobile tunnel that connects midtown Manhattan with Weehawken, NJ under the Hudson (North) river. To provide fresh air and remove dangerous car exhaust, three ventilation towers (two in Manhattan and one in NJ) exchange the air in the tunnels approximately every 90 seconds.
I didn’t notice the “Camera Use Prohibited” sign until it was too late. I guess their secret is out now.
Infrastructure is herioic.
Manhattan boasts six large ventilation towers serving the four automobile tunnels that cross the Hudson and East Rivers: two each for the Lincoln and Holland tunnels, and one each for the Queens-Midtown and Brooklyn Battery Tunnels.
All sport an industrial art deco design reflecting their early/mid 20th century construction. Their large scale and lack of windows lends them an air of mystery; the exterior of the Battery Tunnel building was used as the secret HQ in the Men in Black films.
“Was”? Did they move their HQ?
There are also ventilation structures for the various railroad and subway tunnels that cross the NYC rivers, but their smaller size makes them less prominent. (The electric trains that use these tunnels don’t produce exhaust that has to be as aggressively vented as in an automotive tunnel).
Let me also just mention that photographing buildings from across the street during the day in midtown Manhattan is like playing a video game in “extreme hardcore” mode.
@[email protected] Frogger?
@[email protected] Frogger but for photons?
@[email protected] This is the sort of infrastructure that fascinates me. The sort of stuff one might pass by for years or decades without even wondering what it is; it’s just there.
Close, but MiB headquarters is at 504 Battery Place, NY
