Deluge Monday

It's taken me a bit to get these shots posted. These are from September 13th, when we had that ridiculous late summer thunderstorm. I tried to get to some of the danger areas before they became danger areas, such as the P&W bridge on Southbridge (which is a notorious flooding spot). An hour after I took these, they were fishing cars out of a lake under this bridge. The rain only caused minor flooding, but the manhole covers blew and the sewer system pumped water onto the street until it was five or six feet deep.

Here's the infamous flooding spot on Southbridge, right near Southgate and the railyard. Expand the photo, and you can see the manhole cover in the middle of the road, blowing water like a geyser.




This is Southbridge at Southgate, you can see where another manhole cover had blown and was spewing rainwater.




Here's Main Street, just up from WCUW...



Here's Park Ave. at State Liquors, which is an area that I have never seen flood before. The rain was so heavy at this point that the parking lot was dumping water onto the road faster than it could go down the drains. The curb looked like the lip of a dam. It was wild.

Renewal (and Abandonment) in Main South

Took a lunchtime drive today, and I saw that the front sliding security doors at the former Ha Tien Market on Main Street were open and there's some renovations happening inside:

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This is good news for lovers of our Vietnamese markets and for Main South residents in general. Ha Tien is one of the only grocery options in this neighborhood, and had a reputation for freshness and value. It was my favorite Vietnamese market in the city (sorry Mekong), and I was devastated when it was destroyed in a fire back in March.

Here are some pictures that I took during the fire:






I'm certainly glad to see that it looks like they're going to be reopening at some point.

There's some other rebirths happening in the neighborhood. The Dunkin' Donuts renovation at the corner of Main and Hammond seems to be moving along quickly:

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I also happened upon some long-awaited work being done at the brick apartment buildings on LaGrange Street. My office used to be right behind these buildings, and after a lot of noise about a fixup coming, they sat untouched for years. Looks like that's finally starting to change:

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One piece of land that I'm sure is very familiar to the patriarch of the Wormtown Fleet remains empty, however:

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For those who are not familiar, this is the former site of Yellow Cab's headquarters.

School's In!

Love it or hate it, Worcester is a college town. It cracks me up when I see apartment listings that mention they're located in a "college neighborhood". Seriously, is there any neighborhood in this city that couldn't be considered a college neighborhood?

For the record, I happen to love that Worcester is a college town. I didn't move here to go to school, but I did spend my first year here living that experience vicariously through my Clark friends and roommates, and that's a big part of what made me fall in love with this city in the first place. Plus, it just feels so empty when the students are away. You notice it when you go out to eat, out to the bars, or just driving around. Academia is in the pulse of the city, and that pulse just seems weak when school is out.

These are shots I took today on Florence St., between Maywood and Downing. Most of you will recognize it as the main drag connecting Clark University's on-campus and off-campus residences.

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Three weeks ago, this street would've been mostly empty. For the next eight months, it'll be very hard to park a car anywhere along this stretch...

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I have so many memories of good times on this street. I can attach a story to almost every apartment, porch, yard, and section of sidewalk along this stretch. As just one example, I once got several beverages into a winter's night and took pictures from the top of the parking garage (on the right in photo #2) during a nor'easter. By the time I got too cold to stay up there, the snow drifts were so high that I couldn't walk down the outdoor stairwells, I had to slide down them on my ass...

I'm sure many of you have fond memories here too, you may have even been a part of mine...Share them!

Welcome back Clarkies, and students at all of Worcester's institutes of higher learning!

29 Minute Taxes- And A Blimp

Well, it certainly was an interesting commute home today!

In the very short time I've been doing this, I've already started to notice things that I might not have otherwise. For example, this sign, which I have driven past hundreds of times without actually reading...

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Is it just me, or does the concept of having your taxes done in 29 minutes or less seem a little...off? It's not a pizza, after all. If it takes 31 minutes or 42 minutes or an hour and a half, it's really going to be fine as long as it's done properly. Take your time, tax guy. Seriously.

Anyway...

I thought I might be done shooting for the day, but it turns out I was not, because right now the MetLife blimp is blimping its merry way around Main South.

I first saw it when I was on Stafford St., by the CVS...

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My iPhone doesn't do a great job with long distances, so when I saw it pop out again I pulled over at the Hess in Webster Square...

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Then I tried a digital zoom shot, but unfortunately the iPhone isn't great at that either...

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Finally, I caught a close look at it on Main St. near the Tedeschi...

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Success!

I'm guessing that this was somehow related to the Worcester Tornadoes "Bark in the Park" promotion at Fitton Field tonight, since that's the area it seems to be hovering over. A quick look at the Tornadoes website confirms this...