Two weeks ago the Department of Transportation dismantled a dilapidated dining shed on Morton Street belonging to Snack Taverna restaurant after a sizable piece of metal roofing blew off just after midnight during a storm and lay stretched across the 10-foot-wide road, creating a traffic hazard and the sound of crashing metal waking up the neighborhood.
Residents of Morton Street between Hudson and Bedford Streets rejoiced at removal of the shed, since the block had historically always been a residential block and the shed was considered a rape of the community.
However, despite complaints to DOT about the hazardous storage of metal and glass tables and chairs from the restaurant shed now stacked recklessly on the sidewalk, which is less than a yard wide (see yardstick on sidewalk in above images) and slick with rain and ice in recent weeks—the danger to pedestrians goes unheeded by restaurant owners, DOT, and other authorities. With football mania in the air and packed bars, the probability is high of someone getting spiked by one of the overturned tables or falling into a glass tabletop. A motorbike does not belong parked on this narrow sidewalk either.
The big question is: What exactly is the storage for? Another booze shed, which the neighborhood opposes? A sidewalk cafe on an under three-foot-wide sidewalk?
DOT needs to seriously take action as soon as possible to remove the hazard.
OSCILLATIONS 