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Eyesore of the Week: Mailboxes of Tribeca
I inherited this pet peeve from my first editor, whose disgust with the graffiti-covered mailboxes of the Bronx led him to buy a can of blue paint. This is federal property and the Post Office should care for it properly — and give our streets a bit of a pick-me-up. The photos here are just a sampling, but you get the idea. And I count the green relay boxes the same as blue guys.
I am not a USPS hater — in fact I use it all the time (I send a lot of letters) and I love stamps as objects. The ability to send a note clear across the country for 55 cents is still the best deal in town. And I know the USPS doesn’t get tax dollars and runs its operations from the sale of its products and services. (And it is hogtied by Congress: by law, the USPS can’t raise the price of stamps more than the rate of inflation without congressional approval.)
But still.
This is what they should look like (with a little touch up):
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Would also be great if Councilwoman Chin would get the ACE program back in Tribeca. The sidewalks around Reade Street/Greenwich and the gutters are filled with bottles and trash.
https://www.acenewyork.org/stay-informed/ace-in-the-news/
Agreed. In the vandalized condition, they are a complete eyesore.
I thought I had read something about the 1st Precinct having some sort of graffiti clean up program going on — and yet there’s more graffiti on my neighboring streets than ever before. (as you mentioned Reade St/Greenwich as well as Staple Street has really gone down hill with the more graffiti/trash/booze bottles and kids getting high.
Wow. The Canal Street post office; Margaret Chin; and the 1st Police Precinct, all on the same comments page. It’s like a do-nothing trifecta!
So NIMBYs want to stop all forms of gentrification, which means, keep my ‘hood crapy so I can afford to still live here, but mailboxes with ‘character’ are bad? please…..
Why can’t they just issue a standard paint color available at your local hardware store and allow local communities to fix the boxes themselves if they want to? Even if they have to file an application to for approval first.
Now they penalize you with a huge fine if you take matters into your own hands and paint them yourself. They should let communities repaint them using specific regulated guidelines and whoever wants to take care of them…can.
Currently the post office will never fix them as they don’t have the resources or profit margins to maintain them. Let those communities that are bothered by them fix them themselves and those who want to nothing about it, leave them.
Agreed about USPS…I even like the old Canal Street Post Office. And I also marvel at this massive system that can get a letter from here to there so quickly and so cheaply. It’s all “old-school”, but (most of the time) it works.
(I didn’t know that USPS doesn’t get tax dollars; I assumed it was subsidized that way).
Indeed they do not received any tax payers $ but they have been saddled by criminal demands created by Washington politicians to advance pay their pensions to the point of almost collapsing under the weight of it all. I wonder who was paying off those politicians? Look into it – shocking in a democracy.
I don’t think it’s an accident that the two you show in “better” condition are actual mailboxes (meant for non-postal-employees to send letters) and the vandalized ones are all some sort of official-use-only storage. Are we sure USPS actively uses all the green ones?
They definitely use the one in front of my building, but I see your point. Of course, if they don’t use them, they can take them off the street. We could always use less “furniture” on the sidewalks.
I like them… it’s a form of art for me and reminds me that I live in NYC where people are free to express themselves in different ways. Yes, if you really want to dot the i, it is vandalism, but on such a minor level…on a mail box. It has a history. In the art world, some graffiti sells for millions. If you desire perfectly clean and shiny neighborhoods then let’s talk about the construction and the thousand rats running around the street… that’s serious and can bring a huge health risk. Grafiti and stickers on post boxes…. let it rest. IMO.
Agree with you 100%.
Hopefully anyone wanting to feel helpful and repainting collection boxes can make sure they’re painting those blue and the distribution boxes green.
Why doesn’t Bisoman fall into this category of eyesoredom? Aren’t they both vandalism, thus a crime? Asking for a police friend.
Stop trying to gentrify NYC. Stickers and graffiti are a form of expression that has been part of NYC since the 80’s Is art forms like this that gave this city the charm and character and colorful expression that allowed you to move here from the mid west or wherever you came from driving up the cost of things and making this city lack character. If you want a fancy clean mailbox move to Westchester
Speaking of post office vandalism, the post office at Canal Street is once again a completely eyesore of graffiti. A few years ago, volunteers worked hard to clean it, and it stayed that way for a couple years. Recently, the vandalism began, and now it’s completely covered with random spray paint.
The post office also does nothing to keep the outside area clean. The tree areas are missing…trees. The area is always covered with litter and trash. And the Church street side smells like a filthy public toilet (which apparently it is, probably for the counterfeit sellers across the street). It’s a sad sight.