Free choice infoshare! One other fact into the hopper: Working on the project takes a bunch of equipment. Moving it in and out is something of a pain and leaving it idle on days they cannot work is expensive. So they clear out stuff in the fall and return it in the spring. Predicting weather ahead of time is risky at best. In any case, whether the temp bit is real or not may make less difference now than COVID. That problem is real.
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Pic by me. Taken yesterday.
56 Leonard - 03-06-2021 by Christopher Estevez, on Flickr
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https://www.instagram.com/p/CMD9qjgjCed/?igshid=k12pu4902s2
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https://www.instagram.com/p/CLPDsRxLqn8/?igshid=1m5txx15n9puk
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From 3.14.21:
From 4.4.21:
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I’m not sure if the tone of these image macros are sarcastic but they do make me laugh.
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https://www.instagram.com/p/CPYeNjSsG2s/?utm_medium=copy_link
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Walked by there about ten days ago. No progress. Still boarded up tho now it’s all painted black. With COVID waning it’s hard to know what they are waiting for.
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Maybe they just gave up lol. I can’t believe the quasi-billionaires who live there put up with that. With vaccines there’s no excuse for the crew not to finish this, unless something fell through
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The workers assembling the Bean are Italian nationals. They likely aren’t coming until Italians can travel to the U.S. on business, as in normal times. Hopefully within a few months, if all goes well.
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Thanks crawdad. Didn’t know that.
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They can’t find American workers?
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Who knows. But I did speak with one of the workers when construction was occurring. The tolerances for fitting the pieces together are incredibly fine. Construction had to be halted the first time because cold weather was arriving. The contractions caused by the temps increased the risk of cracking in the bolts and other parts holding it together. Special equipment had to be made to do the work. It is slow and tedious. As far as I know the fabrication of the parts was not done in the US. So it would hardly be surprising if the folks putting it together are not local.
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Right now there is a problem with the work going on on Church st. for that block. One lane is blocked off in the middle forcing traffic up to the curb on the west side next to the bean, They used that lane as a staging area during the earlier bean work so this may be another delay causer
It is a pleasure watching this bean come together gradually - it has become sort of a long running performance art piece - as well as an art installation.
The building construction was quite a long-and-winding-road on the way to completion; so, no surprise the art installation in the lobby area is also taking a bit longer that expected.
When all is done, the time-line will be forgotten and the resulting art/architecture will be all that matters.
So I’m betting for a 2022 resume, I think late 2021 is still too early
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It’s astounding that we still don’t let Europeans come to the US even as they have opened their borders to us.
The current travel laws are insane, one can fly to Mexico or Canada freely but cannot drive across the land border…
For Transatlantic travel, we should simply require a negative test and a vaccination. How could that be a serious threat to our covid numbers?
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https://www.instagram.com/p/CRgWSd7rHav/
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https://www.instagram.com/p/CPyDoR4L55p/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CQhnBGQlp3y/
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I walked by 56 Leonard Street this morning on the way to my office and noticed what seemed like activity! Ladders were around and some openings in the temporary plywood cover had been made. Just then a fellow popped out of the partially constructed bean. Chatted with him. He was British and part of a crew working on the bean. So far all the work has been on the interior–tightening up and aligning the joints previously installed and removing the temporary supports left in place when the sections were first installed. Once that work is completed new sections will be brought to the site and set up. He said that should begin to happen in the next couple of weeks. His crew is scheduled to leave for the winter on November 28 but he hopes they will finish up by then. Fingers crossed! In any case, there finally is some action! And we should begin to see some visible, rather than interior, changes soon. Good news!
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I love this icon, but it’s funny that when it was proposed, 821’ seemed tall. It’s not tall anymore in NYC.