It is about moving
July 1st is moving day for tenants throughout the city and, given a majority of renters, scenes like the one in the feature image can be experienced as incoming and outgoing tenants, to and from the same unit, juggling for loading and unloading space on the same day if not at the same time of day.
Witness the incoming red car pulling the brown trailer next to the city garbage disposal truck, both waiting for coordination of access to the building, and for departure from it of an outgoing tenant’s vehicle.
It is about waiting for a pick-up
As the above image shows, we have here the epitome of a private moment in public space. The outgoing tenants and friends have set up a temporary squat with all their packed belongings, but the mattress, on the building entry way, while waiting for their transportation to arrive as in image below.
It is about loading a private van
The classic mattress on the van roof wraps up the loading of one’s furnishings with that most intimate item to be carried across the city to a new abode under open sky.
It is about waiting for pick-ups of another kind
At sunset, the unwanted furniture and gadgets are left for pick up by scavengers, be they professional recyclers or needy tenants looking for a piece they could use.
Between now and the day the city special trucks pick them up, as shown below, one can see groups of needy tenants lugging a book case, a table, chairs, armchairs, etc. down the city sidewalks to their new unit.
Note: mattresses, by law, are not to be scavenged in order to avoid spreading bed bugs infestation … ultimate reference in public to a private situation.
It is, finally, about fixers in the street
In the days that follow moving it is not strange to see mobile carpenter shop-vans parked in the street with workers adjusting this or that piece of furniture to fit in their new setting.
The last of semi-private moments in full sight of the public … a photo op of a kind in my pursuit of summer fish-eying!
Credit all photos to Maurice Amiel