Throwback Thursday: Behind the Project Lens

Upper Grandview picture: a very pretty jigsaw puzzle/EarthCam® construction camera

If you’re like I am, then you’re checking out the magnificent Hudson River sunrises and sunsets courtesy of the EarthCam® construction cameras strategically located at the New NY Bridge project site.

Tappan Zee Constructors, LLC (TZC) hired the Hackensack, New Jersey-based, webcam technology company to stream the five-year project, satisfying and sparking public interest and curiosity. The first of five cameras was installed last September (2013), offering panoramic and marina views of the bridge at 15-minute intervals, current project information and an interactive archive calendar.

Stokes Creative Group, Inc., TZC’s DBE public involvement consultant, worked with the Thruway team to identify each location and install the cameras,” TZC spokeswoman Carla Julian said. “They were chosen to provide the best views for project construction progress.”

The most recently-added Westchester webcam offers views of the toll plaza, maintenance facility site and abutment. Julian said there are no plans for additional cameras. Images stored remotely in a secure server by EarthCam® can be accessed via the New NY Bridge website.

Each camera takes 9.0 Megapixel images (3456 x 2592 pixels), (1/1.7″ 15.0 Megapixel CCD) from s 2.8 Lens: F/2.8-F/4.5, with a motorized zoom of 28mm-140mm and a 200% zoom range.

“Typically, images are captured and stored only one per hour,” Julian explained. “The project team chose to configure these cameras to take one image every 15 minutes to allow the public to see even more of the work that is progressing,” Julian explained

That interval “was determined to be the proper time that would allow the camera to capture an image and upload it to the server,” she said.

So you see the best quality picture of the progress to email, save, or post via Twitter or Facebook.

“The web cameras continue to be the most popular section of the website attracting hundreds of visitors each week,” Julian said. “It is estimated that by the end of the project almost 700,000 images will have been collected.”

You know the video “Project Year 2014 in Two Minutes” that’s popular with the public and with educational outreach presentations?

The video shows TZC’s armada of floating cranes and hundreds of workers installing nearly two-thirds of the new bridge’s foundation piles during the first 12 months of construction.

It’s an example of the webcams’ other goal “to create time-lapse video programs that show the new bridge rise out of the Hudson in a few short minutes,” she said.

All five — in Rockland (Upper Grandview), on the bridge’s main span, at the Tarrytown Marina, in Tarrytown and at the Westchester landing — will remain positioned through the project’s completion.

Which are your favorite EarthCam® views?

My article originally appeared in the Rockland County Times February 12, 2015.

Copyright © Janie Rosman and Kaleidoscope Eyes 2019

Take S. Franklin St. Extension to South Nyack

Welcome to Exit 10, whose new configuration directs motorists to turn right on Hillside Avenue/Route 9W northbound. They continue to either the S. Franklin Street Extension into South Nyack or north to their destinations.

Photos of the new configuration at Exit 10 are courtesy of the New York State Thruway Authority.

At least one lane northbound from Tarrytown to Exit 10 will be closed next week from Tuesday to Friday, from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m., so crews can work on the roadway. See press release for details.

I’d like to know what you think.

Copyright © Janie Rosman and Kaleidoscope Eyes 2019

Exit 10: South Nyack will be via Route 9W North

Your guess is as good as mine why the bottom and lower right corner of this page are blank. Maybe to emphasize where motorists exiting the Thruway at Exit 10 in South Nyack will have to drive to reach the village.

The area outlined in yellow had uneven road bumps and cracks. /©1999-2005 by N. W. Perry.

See the red X? Remember how you complained about the congestion with traffic from 9W South? And the road bumps and crevices?

Good news. Starting this week per a recent press release, you’ll have an extra turn in the other direction only to drive north, then east, and wind up at the same location as before. how many minutes will it add to your commute home?

At least one lane northbound from Tarrytown to Exit 10 will be closed from Monday to Friday, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., so crews can work on the roadway.

I’m curious about the new configuration, and I’d like to know what you think.

Copyright © Janie Rosman and Kaleidoscope Eyes 2019

Five Years Ago Today: the Super Crane Arrived

Courtesy of Phil Little

Will Van Dorp, professor at Union County College in New Jersey, met the I Lift NY this very cold morning as it arrived from the West Coast at our very own Port Jersey Facility – The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey – escorted by tug boats Lauren Foss and Iver Foss. after docking at a private facility in Jersey City, it will stay put until it comes north to the Tappan Zee Bridge this spring.

Excitement, cameras, and (perhaps) a sigh of relief — it’s finally here — greeted the I Lift NY‘s arrival two days ago. I’m guessing the relief part.

Nowhere among the day’s pictures did I see any like the first three snapped by waterblogger Will Van Dorp; he captured I Lift NY‘s approach on the aquatic horizon, led by tugboat Lauren Foss, adding drama to suspense. Tugboat Iver Foss followed.

A New York state of mind is also apparent in these pictures taken by photographer Phil Little with the Freedom Tower and Statue of Liberty background.

Sunlight bathed the Tappan Zee bridge shortly before the I Lift NY’s arrival at The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey./EarthCam® construction camera in Tarrytown

Correction: Two weeks ago prior to the original post I said the crane, owned by Tappan Zee Constructors, LLC (TZC) was renamed. It wasn’t. It was dubbed, nicknamed. Long ago and far away, it was christened the “Left Coast Lifter” for its work on the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge construction project. That was then, this is now.

I’d like to know what you think.

Copyright © Janie Rosman and Kaleidoscope Eyes 2019

After a Carwash-like Rainstorm, Beauty Appears

And after it rains there’s a rainbow is a line from Simon & Garfunkel’s song “My Little Town.” A gorgeous rainbow captured by the EarthCam® construction camera this afternoon brought those lyrics to mind.

I’d like to know what you think.

Copyright © Janie Rosman and Kaleidoscope Eyes 2019