Photo Gallery: Bare Trees On a Winters Day

When You Think About It. Thoughts on the New Tappan Zee Bridge

Words and photo by F LoBuono

Ambivalence. True to the essence of the word, it is both blessing and curse to the writer. And so it is with today's topic. I love being compelled to write it. But I also hate the need to do so. The very topic of this entry is loaded with it. Before I get totally obtuse, allow me to give the necessary background.

As a thirty-year resident of the Village of South Nyack, I have come to know this place, I believe, intimately. It has touched my soul like no other. Although I have had the good fortune to be able to live almost anywhere, it is South Nyack that I have chosen to inhabit. I have sung the praises of its physical beauty in this blog and elsewhere. But its real strength lies in the quality and commitment of its citizenry. I have also been critical of its shortcomings when I believed it necessary. No place on earth is paradise, and South Nyack is certainly not the exception. It is a real place to live - with real amenities and real challenges. Keeping the amenities and dealing with those challenges requires vigilance.

With that in mind, I was glad to attend a meeting that took place at Nyack College (Thursday 3/20/2014) and was organized by the Governor's Office, the Village of South Nyack and the new South Nyack TZ Bridge Task Force (SNTZBTF). Representing Governor Cuomo was Brian Conybeare. South Nyack was represented by its mayor, Bonnie Christian. The three member SNTZBTF consisted of Connie Coker, Jerry Ilowite, and Richard Kohlhausen. The expressed purpose of the meeting was to share preliminary ideas on how to construct the new Tappan Zee Bridge's Shared Use Path (SUP) which is scheduled to have a portal in the Village. It was also expressed that the meeting would listen to residents' concerns for further consideration. I am not very good at estimating crowds, but I would think it safe to say that the meeting was attended by about one hundred very concerned citizens.

Now, this is a complex issue - too complex to address in great detail here. If you need to know more in terms of specifics, please consult the State and South Nyack websites for more information. If I may, I will attempt to boil down the main issues. And, keep that word, ambivalence, in mind when you read further.

 As part of the new bridge, a walking/biking path (or Shared Use Path/SUP) is to be included. It will stretch the full three miles of the span with one end/beginning (portal) to be located in South Nyack (at the corner of Cornelison and South Broadway, across from the Village Hall) and the other in Westchester County's Village of Tarrytown. There are proposed viewing areas along the way to take advantage of what are, without a doubt going to be spectacular vistas.

OK. Now here is the ambivalence as I see it. I am a big walker and bike rider. I know that I will be one of the first to take advantage of the SUP when it is completed and opened. I LOVE that. However, I also live a mere two blocks from the portal. If I am anxious to take advantage of the SUP, won't hundreds, maybe THOUSANDS of others want to do the same? What will we do with the traffic, the parking, the garbage, the associated expenses, etc.? What will it do to privacy, particularly to the residents of Cornelison St.? What will it do to property values? This part I HATE. It's bound to have a huge impact on those of us who live at "ground zero"! Citizen after citizen expressed their concern. One man asked, "do you have any idea how many will come on a 4th of July to witness the fireworks from the center of the Hudson"? It was rhetorical but it was also not. Unfortunately, the panel could not answer. The Governor's office has ordered a study to be conducted on other, similar venues to provide possible estimates. However, none of us can really know until we know. The panel presented its "possible" vision of how to make the portal work where it is currently proposed. These proposals including making the portal as compatible with the existing architecture as possible, as well as creating more parking at the current Village Hall complex though renovation or even relocation. They also explained that the Thruway authority would ultimately bare the burden of the costs of construction and maintenance.

Another major concern worth mentioning is the status of Exit 10. Many of us who have traveled West off the Tappan Zee Bridge to exit in South Nyack are well familiar with it. It makes a large, winding loop over the Thruway before it merges with 9W. This issue is a particularly thorny one for the residents of the Village. It is a constant reminder that, sixty years ago, under very shady circumstance, the State of New York and the Thruway Authority rammed the first Tappan Zee Bridge right through the heart of the Village of South Nyack. One third of the entire village was lost. One third. A small but vibrant downtown was lost, never to return. Exit 10 rests on land that was once that vibrant downtown and the Village wants it back. It has become a symbol of what was lost. Furthermore, it would be perfect for the South Nyack portal. It is not in a residential area and there is plenty of room for cars. Most people questioned why we weren't pursuing that option more vigorously? The problem is, the Village does not own it yet - and may never. The panel put forth that it is negotiating for the parcel but that it is VERY early in the negotiations. In the meantime, they were offering what they believed to be viable alternatives and eliciting community feedback.

Many residents expressed frustration with the process, siting a lack of communication on the part of both State and Local officials. Many also felt that, although their voices were currently being heard, it would lead to no real good - the decision had been made, as it had been sixty years ago and South Nyack, once again, was left "holding the bag".

Here's my take, and this is where the ambivalence really takes over: Everyone who lives in the immediate area of the portal WILL BE IMPACTED. It is inevitable. We may claim this to be unfair, but progress and change is sometimes painful - until it is not. Some will never see beyond the inconvenience. Others, like me, will see it for the opportunity to take even more advantage of one of the things that makes this place so wonderful to live in; a natural beauty, second to none. And, please don't tell me that when you have visitors from out of town, you are not going to take them to the Bridge and the SUP! Ah, yes, the ambivalence!

I was also taken aback by the vitriol with which some residents expressed their concerns. People were angry and frustrated. That can be a dangerous combination. I get it. I live here, too. However, to subject the people on the panel, who, in my mind, had obviously worked very long and hard to come up with viable alternatives is just plain rude. Passion is good. Misplaced anger is not. These people are our neighbors, as well. This is another source of ambivalence for me. I love that people are involved and participate. I hate that they do it in such a vicious manner.

It really is a case of NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard), the syndrome that plagues almost every community in every country around the world. Sure, it sounds like a great idea, but can't you put it somewhere else? Well, in this case, as in so many others, the answer is, well, NO. But people hear what they want to hear. And, from what I saw and heard at this meeting, we have a CHANCE to make something work for us, as best we can - with a commitment to continue to improve until we get it just right!

In the meantime, I intend to see the glass as half-full. I will, indeed, be one of the first ones on the SUP when it opens. And if the Village or State fails in their commitment to me and the other residents, it will be once again our duty to hold them to it. This is our civic duty. We do our best to make every situation the best and, the rest of the time, remain vigilant. This has been the key to this Village's success and will remain so. This situation is no different. The world is what you make it.

Today's MOZEN: In Praise of The Spaldene

Words and photos by F LoBuono

When I was a kid growing up in the 60's, the word "gang" had a completely different connotation. At that time, Fort Lee, NJ, was in a state of transformation, and so were we. Fort Lee was changing from a small town, most famous for being the birth place of the movie industry, to a sort-of 6th Borough of New York. We were in the process of being City Kids to becoming so-called Suburban ones. Most of my friends' families had emigrated from the Bronx. Some, like mine, came from Brooklyn. Either way, we brought many of the City Street traditions and games, as well as our accents, with us.

One of the traditions was to have a gang. Now, at this time, it had NO association with violence. It meant kids in the neighborhood who shared similar ages, backgrounds, and culture; particularly street culture. Boys and girls mixed freely in our 'hood. There was me, my brother Joe, and my sister Joanne. Gary and Michele were down the block. Joe Del and his sister Kathy lived on the corner. Ritchie and Frankie were on the next corner. Jerry and Joe were just down the street from the them. Bobby and his older brother, Joe were just a few blocks away. Our ages, proximity, and, in general, our backgrounds and goals, made it easy to come together and share things we were most comfortable with.  This was clearly expressed in the games we played. In addition to new ones that suited our spacious, new surroundings - we actually had grassy fields to play on - we continued playing many of those we had learned during our brief stays in the Bronx or Brooklyn. These included "Ring-O-Leeveo", and "Red Light-Green Light" which required no equipment. Others, like "Box Ball", "Stoop Ball" and the ubiquitous "Stick Ball", obviously required, well, at least a ball.

Those games, according to street etiquette, HAD to be played with only one type of ball: The Spalding "High- Bounce" ball. And, despite it's rather simple spelling, the name was to be pronounced only one way: SPALDENE. If you were to pronounce it any other way, you were immediately marked as a rube and not truly worthy of the game. Despite years of extensive and exhaustive research, I have yet to discover the origins of the pronunciation Spaldene. Be that as it may, Spaldenes were used exclusively because they were just perfect for the type of games we played. Hard, but not too, durable, cheap, and pink, they could take a liking and keep on ticking. For Box Ball, one could squeeze them just enough to add enough spin or "english" to make your serve difficult to return. With Stoop Ball, they were just hard enough that, if you flung it with all of your might and hit the corner of one of the stairs just right, the recoil would send it far over your opponent's head for a sure home run. The same could be said for Stick Ball. It was just the right size and weight to hurl it a great speeds. The consistency was such that you could squeeze it to make it dip and spin. As a hitter, with the proper, sawed-off broom stick for a bat (another prerequisite for the game to be properly played), and you nailed it on the "sweet spot", you could send that baby sailing, well, a City block! And it was durable enough to take the pounding it was bound to after a 9-inning game of Stick Ball!

Now, in Fawt Lee (another native pronunciation), suiting our transformation, we played a modified version of Stick Ball. In the City version, it is played on the open street and the pitcher bounces the ball before the hitter. The game can be played with anywhere between 4 and 6 participants. Safe hits were usually measured by the batted ball traveling the distance of sewer drains or manhole covers. Outs were registered by not reaching these marks, having the ball caught (if you had a fielder), or by strikeout. Our game combined some of the City's while taking advantage of our new, more spacious surrounds. Instead of playing it in the streets, we would find a wall, usually at one of the schools in town, and spray paint (or chalking - most preferred by school janitors everywhere!) a box that would suit the strike zone of most players. This would eliminate the need for at least one player, the catcher. So, you could play with as few as two participants. This adaptation would also allow the pitcher to throw the ball more like a true baseball player. Since no bounce was involved and there was no need for a catcher, the pitcher could throw as hard as he liked and add trick pitches if he had them. This, of course, made it more difficult as a hitter. We believed it made it more like the professional game where good pitching almost always trumped good hitting. Hits and outs were recorded in similar fashion to the "City game".

This made the Spaldene even more essential to our game. You could throw it hard and, so, when you connected, you could hit it equally hard. And when you didn't (which was most often), it had to take the pounding of being smashed against a brick wall - again and again. And the Spaldene could handle it. It was almost solid rubber so it could take a beating. I always felt the pink color belied the fact that they were actually so durable. There would be a time when they would eventually split apart, but that was normally after a few games. And they were cheap, so we always made sure that we had an extra on hand for those lost to wear and tear or fouled-back unto the roof of one of the schools (in addition to irate school officials, one of the hazards of our game).

The Spaldene and Stick Ball become part of our lexicon and our lives. There were periods when I was growing up that, at any given time of a day, on any given school yard, you could find a game of Stick Ball. For us, it became a central part of our daily lives, especially when school was out for the summer. I remember playing Stick Ball almost every hour of every day in the summer. Of course, this is an exaggeration, but it did play that significant a role as to have created that memory.We formed leagues and kept statistics. We knew who the aces and sluggers were. And some kids were both. I remember how competitive I was. I didn't like losing at all. You'd think that, with my disdain for defeat, I would have been better at it. I wasn't. I lost more than I won. But, in those days, it didn't matter all that much. What mattered was that you competed and you had fun, in the most simple way, with your friends. It seemed that there was always a way to drum up a game of Stick Ball. And, so, it was one of the most wholesome of activities, combining physical activity with social bonding.

But I'm not sure if anyone plays Stick Ball, or any of the games that I remember from my childhood, any more. I suppose that, as with all things, methods, moods, and morals change. This is reflected in the games children play. In my travels, I don't see kids playing Stick Ball anymore - or Box Ball - or Stoop Ball - or even Red Light. Green Light. These simple games, involving both physical and social skills, have been replaced by those requiring little more than an ass and two thumbs. The wave of technology has transformed all of our lives. It is no different for children. In fact, they are most directly involved with, and, I should add, evolved, by technology. Their reality is reinforced by the games we offer them to play. And, remember, ADULTS design games and toys for children. Now, in the New World of the Video Game, young people (and many adults) are occupied by sitting on their asses and using there thumbs to play (mostly) violent games that require less physical exertion that getting up and walking to the bathroom to take a leak. Not all young people are completely mesmerized by the splashy graphics and hyper-realism of the games. But most are. It is the wave of the future. I do not fear change for it is inevitable. And I don't want to over romanticize the past. However, it does give me cause for concern.

While taking my 90 year-old mother to her beauty parlor appointment in the town of Westwood, NJ, I stopped in one of my favorite stores which happens to be located around the corner. It's a REAL, old-fashioned 5&10 Cent Store. It sells EVERYTHING. In fact, I think that I did about 90% of my Christmas shopping there this year! It takes me so happily back to another aspect of my youth: the old Woolworth's 5&10 - long ago out of business. There are so few left. Well, imagine my surprise and joy when, while perusing the aisles, I spied a box of pink balls. I thought to myself, could it be?  I came closer. Sure enough, it was a box of official Spalding High- Bounce Balls! $1.49 each - a little more than we used to spend for one, but, still a bargain! Perhaps, there is still hope. Now, if I could only find a broom handle, and a wall with a strike zone painted on it . . .

MY LIFE IN NYACK: Winter 5

MY LIFE IN NYACK: Winter 4

 

 

Photo Galery: ABSTRACTS 1