These images and the artifacts themselves – the drainage channels incised in stone more than a century ago around now moribund coal chute covers--make palpable the difficult-to-keep-in-mind idea that the ground is constructed: the fact that, in Tribeca and other previously industrial areas of the city, the ground is hollow. These sidewalks, slabs of granite, eight feet wide or larger, six inches thick or more, are supported by steel framing and masonry walls above the interior vault spaces to which coal was delivered to industrial buildings.
The fact that none of these artifacts is active endows them with a kind of muteness and opacity. Yet as weathered traces, they register different eras of construction and settlement, the movement of water, the movement of pedestrians. In their different shapes and forms, they also register the individuals who made them.
The mysterious presence of these elements of city ground makes tangible the particularity and diversity of Tribeca’s everyday spaces, adding to the poignance of our neighborhood.
The cuts and patches register different eras of construction and settlement, the movement of water, the movement of pedestrians.