I thought I was going to be spared this time. I guess I thought wrong.
I am not going anywhere for a while. Good thing I have some cookies to eat.
Showing posts with label Palermo Viejo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Palermo Viejo. Show all posts
Friday, November 13, 2009
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Row row row your boat...3 (2008)
Thursday 28th of February started out hectic for me, but not nearly as hectic as it ended up being. The kids at the factory ended up saving our neck.
In the first video you can see a car that was floating towards our store. Luckily, the bars that I had installed on the curb stopped its progress. The kids thought that the store window was going to break against the onslaught of waves from the passing buses that went by, but the glass held.
This street gets flooded every year. We knew that and that is why we installed these metal flood doors in front of the store and inside behind the garage door. We also gave the building some height. In the past, the flood doors would keep the water at bay, but this time it was higher.
One of the kids filmed these on his phone. I was out running an errand when the storm hit and I was trying to make it back to the factory, but it was impossible. I was hoping to at least cut off the access to the street to make sure that the buses would not try to go through.
The water ended up going higher than what is shown in either of these videos. The water line itself did not end up going over the flood doors, but the waves did.
In the end, there was no damage done from the water. We did loose a batch of brownies though due to the lack of electricity that hit while they were in the oven.
These kids kept the water from reaching our elevator shaft through quick thinking on their end. I am actually very proud of them.
The mayor of the city has promised that he will make the necessary improvements to the city so that these floods do not happen again. This is a mayor with a goal set on the President´s chair in the future, so he might actually do something about this. In any case, I will wait and see.
Some more positive things I took from this event came from Edenor. They came out and made improvements to the substation that houses the transformer serving our block. Apparently they physically moved the transformer so that it would be out of reach of the water or at least it would not be as exposed to flooding as it has in the past. I wrote about the last flood in post 1 and 2 titled "Row Row Row Your Boat". They even informed us as to when they were going to cut electricity, and when they had to enter our factory they even took their muddy boots off. They kept the downtime to a minimum and came around to do a final check before they left for the day. Now that is class and great customer service.
In the first video you can see a car that was floating towards our store. Luckily, the bars that I had installed on the curb stopped its progress. The kids thought that the store window was going to break against the onslaught of waves from the passing buses that went by, but the glass held.
This street gets flooded every year. We knew that and that is why we installed these metal flood doors in front of the store and inside behind the garage door. We also gave the building some height. In the past, the flood doors would keep the water at bay, but this time it was higher.
One of the kids filmed these on his phone. I was out running an errand when the storm hit and I was trying to make it back to the factory, but it was impossible. I was hoping to at least cut off the access to the street to make sure that the buses would not try to go through.
The water ended up going higher than what is shown in either of these videos. The water line itself did not end up going over the flood doors, but the waves did.
In the end, there was no damage done from the water. We did loose a batch of brownies though due to the lack of electricity that hit while they were in the oven.
These kids kept the water from reaching our elevator shaft through quick thinking on their end. I am actually very proud of them.
The mayor of the city has promised that he will make the necessary improvements to the city so that these floods do not happen again. This is a mayor with a goal set on the President´s chair in the future, so he might actually do something about this. In any case, I will wait and see.
Some more positive things I took from this event came from Edenor. They came out and made improvements to the substation that houses the transformer serving our block. Apparently they physically moved the transformer so that it would be out of reach of the water or at least it would not be as exposed to flooding as it has in the past. I wrote about the last flood in post 1 and 2 titled "Row Row Row Your Boat". They even informed us as to when they were going to cut electricity, and when they had to enter our factory they even took their muddy boots off. They kept the downtime to a minimum and came around to do a final check before they left for the day. Now that is class and great customer service.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
The City that Fades Away II
This is another entry into Jeff Barry´s series titled The City that Fades Away.
Okay, so I may be getting carried away with this but I wanted to show the other side of the neighborhood. This is an example of what is going on over here. This used to be a home and it was rehabbed into a boutique shoe store. This is on El Salvador (4600 block between Malabia and Armenia).
The dark splotches above the awning are due to humidity. This is most likely the original facade of a home that was built around 1900. This store owner left the facade untouched.
Next to this store is what used to be a home. This was a chalet style home so no loss there to the neighborhood. I thought it was a pretty good idea to have the construction site covered with a wooden wall in the shape of a house. If you click on the pictures you will get a slightly bigger image to look at. Also notice that in the street, right in front of the shoe store, a sink hole is developing. I wonder when they will get around to fixing that?
Right along this same block you have Cluny and Mott. Around the corner you have Spell Cafe and so many more restaurants that I don´t want to name them all.
Okay, so I may be getting carried away with this but I wanted to show the other side of the neighborhood. This is an example of what is going on over here. This used to be a home and it was rehabbed into a boutique shoe store. This is on El Salvador (4600 block between Malabia and Armenia).
The dark splotches above the awning are due to humidity. This is most likely the original facade of a home that was built around 1900. This store owner left the facade untouched.
Next to this store is what used to be a home. This was a chalet style home so no loss there to the neighborhood. I thought it was a pretty good idea to have the construction site covered with a wooden wall in the shape of a house. If you click on the pictures you will get a slightly bigger image to look at. Also notice that in the street, right in front of the shoe store, a sink hole is developing. I wonder when they will get around to fixing that?
Right along this same block you have Cluny and Mott. Around the corner you have Spell Cafe and so many more restaurants that I don´t want to name them all.
Monday, June 11, 2007
The City that Fades Away
Jeff Barry is the owner of the blog Buenos Aires, City of Faded Elegance and he started an irregular series of posts about buildings that are currently fading away, crumbling, and most likely will be facing a wrecking crew in the near future. The post is titled The City that Fades Away.
I decided to chip in and send in this picture of a building in my neighborhood. I live in what has always been a residential neighborhood and now is one of the city´s hottest tourist destination spots, Palermo Soho, which happens to be part of Palermo Viejo. This area is now currently known for it´s street lined boutiques, recycled homes, and restaurants. When I moved there it was such a quite neighborhood. My own house was built around the late 1800´s (obviously recycled). I used to have a fruit stand on the corner and the nearest serious restaurant was several blocks away. Now I have no more fruit stand, and I have to put up with people parking in front of my garage, but I don´t even have to leave my block to have a choice of at least four good restaurants.
This picture I took looking down El Salvador from the intersection with Armenia. Just a couple doors down, on the corner, is Mark´s Deli, and our newest famous new neighbor is non other than Francis Ford Coppola himself. There is still life within this building. Every once in a while I see someone going in or out. However, the balconies are in such bad state that I don´t even dare walk underneath them for fear that they would fall at any moment.
The parks in this area used to be old as well. They are all being recycled by the city. This was an election year so all the parks got recycled. Palermo Viejo is fading away rather quickly. I wonder if they will still call it "Viejo" after there is nothing old left about it.
I decided to chip in and send in this picture of a building in my neighborhood. I live in what has always been a residential neighborhood and now is one of the city´s hottest tourist destination spots, Palermo Soho, which happens to be part of Palermo Viejo. This area is now currently known for it´s street lined boutiques, recycled homes, and restaurants. When I moved there it was such a quite neighborhood. My own house was built around the late 1800´s (obviously recycled). I used to have a fruit stand on the corner and the nearest serious restaurant was several blocks away. Now I have no more fruit stand, and I have to put up with people parking in front of my garage, but I don´t even have to leave my block to have a choice of at least four good restaurants.
This picture I took looking down El Salvador from the intersection with Armenia. Just a couple doors down, on the corner, is Mark´s Deli, and our newest famous new neighbor is non other than Francis Ford Coppola himself. There is still life within this building. Every once in a while I see someone going in or out. However, the balconies are in such bad state that I don´t even dare walk underneath them for fear that they would fall at any moment.
The parks in this area used to be old as well. They are all being recycled by the city. This was an election year so all the parks got recycled. Palermo Viejo is fading away rather quickly. I wonder if they will still call it "Viejo" after there is nothing old left about it.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Row row row your boat...2
After 36 hours of no electricity we are finally back up. I also realized that the pictures I posted are tiny and you can't make out the tractor almost totally submerged in the construction site. Here is a link to bigger pictures.
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Row row row your boat...
Last night's storm caused havoc all over the city. The usual places that always flood well, you guessed it, they flooded again. Juan B. Justo is one of those trouble spots that floods. Mind you, the actual street doesn't since it sits pretty high compared to all the side streets that feed into it. Sugar & Spice sits on one of those side streets.We knew it and we built the factory with that in mind. Our garage door is street level but the floor is on an angle going up. Our store has a couple of steps so people walk up to the store. We also bought these metal doors for the shop so that the waves can break againts that instead of washing into the store. This works as long as the water level does not breach the height of these metal doors.
So it rained and we put up our door and everything worked like a charm. I just have to remember to get some hip boots so that I can walk out of there in these situations. My employees took to wrapping their feet in plastic bags and sealing them with tape to walk out. It looked funny but it also worked. I managed to leave last night and was feeling pretty good about how the factory and the kids took the storm. That good feeling would be turn a little sour in the morning.
The kids showed up to a lifeless factory. No electricity was running. They didn't know what to do. The culprit was the construction site right in front of us. The building is part of Quartier. They have several apartment towers. This one is scheduled to be finished by 2009. So far, everytime we have had heavy rain the construction site has become a huge pool as you can see by the pictures. These pictures were taken from the roof of Sugar & Spice.
Obviously, we call Edenor to see what they can tell us. On the phone they said that they had no record of their being any problems in the area. I was wondering then what the big semi with the huge generator and several small Edenor vans were doing along Juan B. Justo? She repeated that she knew of no problems being reported. Meanwhile here are pictures of the Edenor vans and pumps working feverishly to pump the water out of their generator room or whatever they call it. It s
eems that this time the water from the construction site broke into Edenor's generator, which is below ground.Normally the construction site has several pumps that would be working to take all the water out but because there is no electricity... I think that a snail will have a better chance of crossing this block before Edenor can empty the water out with that one little gas pump.
I do have to hand it to them though. They have been working since 3am regardless of their lack of progress. I just hope that they get a bigger pump. I wonder if maybe they can plug that semi directly to my factory??
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)