douglaston


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Both the MTA and the weathermen blew it on Saturday, April 5th--the MTA because it usually does, cancelling LIRR trains for trackwork from Shea Stadium to Woodside, and the weathermen, by forecasting rain and drizzle. The sun shone all day long, and there was your webmaster confined to Queens.

I blithely ignored all the previous problems this winter with the #7 train (between Flushing and Times Square) on weekends. After all the LIRR is 2 blocks from my house and it's never cancelled! Well the MTA can put you back in your place just when you're feeling invulnerable, I can assure you. I could have taken the subway in, but it would have been a pain in the neck switching trains in Flushing Meadows, so I confined myself to my neighborhood. And found...

...for one thing, found a new set of steps at Aurora Pond, the small lake in Udalls Cove Park, accessible from near the LIRR tracks via the Street With Three Names. (see the linked page for Udalls Cove details).

The path is held in place with tree trunks and cut pieces and sprinkled with wood chips. It's pretty steep in areas--you really have to pick up your feet to ascend it. It links the back end of Aurora Pond with...

...Douglas Road, near the bend where it becomes 38th Road.

If you look to the left at the bend, you can see how far the old stairway into Udalls Cove Park had deteriorated.

Speeders are dissuaded from crashing into the guardrail by this pair of red warning lights at the bend.

We have now arrived in the next neighborhood west of Little Neck, Douglaston. (There is a Forgotten Fan named Doug Douglass, but he does not live in Douglaston.)

GOOGLE MAP: DOUGLASTON

Beginning here, a selection of incredible homes that I will never afford, and in fact, I have no idea how anyone can. (I know, some people say the very fact that I cannot imagine owning such homes is the primary explanation about why I cannot own one.) Anyway I will forever vicariously have to experience sitting on the gazebo drinking Corona on June afternoons here. Or vicariously imagine hanging out up in the alcove blogging. This one is on 38th Road near Hillcrest.

A pair on Hillcrest. I was attracted especially by the multi-paned doors on the house on the right.

Amazing home at Hillcrest Avenue and 39th Avenue. Showing it twice so you can savor the huge lawn and even better, the enclosed porch on the 39th Avenue side.

Douglaston has recently become a NYC Historic District and has a new batch of maroon street signs with a black band at the top. But how do these two signs differ?

They differ in the typefonts of the "Douglaston Historic District" in the black band...the one on the left is in Highway Gothic, while the one on the right is in Bodoni Bold. Most of these signs had previously used Century Bold in the black band.

Yet another home beyond my capacity for wonder. It is built on the steep hill that runs through Douglaston from north to south just east of Douglaston Parkway and the wraparound porch commands views of the west and south.

A look at the Belgian block gutter on 39th Avenue (some streets in Douglaston have above-ground pipes here as well) and the Historic District map. This one is in the traditional Century typefont.

Douglaston RR station, Douglaston Pkway and 235th Street. The station used to have a canopy of trees, but all LIRR stations on the Port Washington line were denuded of trees by the LIRR in the summer and fall of 2007, the LIRR citing safety concerns, ie. leaves making tracks slippery.

Thus, while the city announed plans to plant 1 million trees by 2030, NYC and its agencies have been hellbent on cutting many of them down.

I covered the Douglaston National Bank, Douglaston Pkway north of Northern Boulevard, in September 2007, but I cannot resist photographing it every time I pass by.

This majestic view of Zion Episcopal Church is available from Northern Blvd. east of Douglaston Parkway. I covered the church on ForgottenTour 31 in August 2007.

There's a short path into Udalls Cove Park available from a break in a chain link fence on Northern Blvd. and 245th Street. The path is nothing special but it does grant a look at Gabler's Creek, which runs through a ravine on the Douglaston-Little Neck border.

Several trees are carved like this (left)...are they going to get cut down as well?

Forgotten Fan Christopher Camastro: Girdling is a forestry practice to kill a tree, in this case to stop their spread into the meadow. That species is a black locust, I can tell by the bark, which is quite invasive. Dead trees left in grassy area provide prime nesting habitat for cavity seeking birds and mammals. I am assuming that was why that tree was girdled, they also used black locust for that path by Aurora Pond because it is hard as a rock and decays slowly.

Headed home to complex de webmaster after a partly fulfilling afternoon.

Page completed April 7, 2008

erpietri@earthlink.net