{"id":3774,"date":"2010-10-21T16:26:07","date_gmt":"2010-10-21T20:26:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.uncommongoods.com\/?p=3774"},"modified":"2011-11-25T16:09:18","modified_gmt":"2011-11-25T21:09:18","slug":"not-your-average-waterway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/2010\/not-your-average-waterway\/","title":{"rendered":"Not Your Average Waterway"},"content":{"rendered":"

When my boyfriend proposed that the two of us canoe through the Gowanus Canal, I was mortified.\u00a0 The smell!\u00a0 The filth!\u00a0 He wanted me to canoe in the troubled body of water that has recently reached an all-time low of being listed as a Superfund National Priority!\u00a0 Secretly my griping eventually turned into guilt.\u00a0 Maybe it would be good to get involved, learn the history and see the improvements being made to an area just a few blocks from our home.\u00a0 Here is our story of canoeing in Brooklyn.<\/p>\n

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Firstly, for those that don’t know, the Gowanus Canal is a lamented waterway in Brooklyn, NY that once served as a busy cargo transportation hub until the 1950’s.\u00a0 It has been neglected and misused since then.<\/p>\n

Our day began by meeting up with The Gowanus Dredgers Canoe Club as a part of
\nOpen House New York.\u00a0 This volunteer organization strives to transform the “dilapidated, historically significant estuary into a self-sustaining, environmentally friendly and healthy waterfront to be enjoyed and treasured by current and future generations.”\u00a0 We’re in.\u00a0 Let’s go!\u00a0 After a brief overview of the canal’s vast history and ending with it’s downfall into an environmental disaster, we were pushed from the shore (or curb) with nothing but two paddles and our urban street smarts.<\/p>\n

I was instantly relieved at the sight of a houseboat!\u00a0 Not too far from where we began, it seemed as if someone has been residing in an old boat in the heart of the canal.\u00a0 We later came to learn that this was not the case.\u00a0 Meet Jerko The Gowanus Water Vacuum, a salvaged houseboat that is now a laboratory and showspace for DIY sustainability projects!\u00a0 This is a truly inspiring story as Jerko is wrapped in a floating wetland ecosystem.\u00a0 It’s filters “absorb and digest the sewage strewn waters through which it is piloted.”\u00a0 This remarkable living machine hardly even scrapes the surface of the staggering amount of effort put forth to clean up the canal.<\/p>\n

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The entire journey was an eye-opening experience from Union Street into the Gowanus Bay.\u00a0 The sight of a post-industrial dumping ground of waste and sewage.\u00a0 The rusted ships and overhead passes.\u00a0 The old broken pipes and the floating garbage.\u00a0 An unadulterated view into absolute decay.<\/p>\n

The closer we got to the bay as the water quality improved, the more I realized that the canal can actually be helped.\u00a0 Between the volunteers, organizations, new oxygenation tactics, EPA Superfund status, and us – we’ll be able to see that the Gowanus Canal, like many other bodies of water, will continue to see the improvements it deserves.\u00a0 As of right now, the canal is undergoing a $140 million, four-year cleanup.\u00a0 I encourage anyone nearby to take the same journey that we did.\u00a0 Float along the canal, look up and imagine Jason Schwartzman as Jonathan Ames dangling from his ankles.\u00a0 Or if this suits you better, pretend you are Melvin, take a dip in the canal and emerge as the new Toxic Avenger: Park Slope Superhero.\u00a0 This could be your last chance at fame before the cleanup begins!<\/p>\n

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Our designer Jessica goes canoeing in Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":3775,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3774"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3774"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3774\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}