Photo Gallery: Streetlights
 These
"gumball" pendant-type fixtures lit up a walkbridge
spanning the Battery Tunnel's Manhattan entrance plaza. I shot
this in the summer of 1982 and have no idea if they still survive.
They shared the same basic forward look that marked the late
40's and early 50's jet age. Although more angular than these
looping poles, the JFK snake-poles attempted much the same effect.
Already by 1982, these were among the last rare handfuls of gumball
type lumes left alive within NYC. The Battery Tunnel plaza was
also a treasure trove of ancient longarmed cast iron poles, which
for lack of a better name, I dubbed Corvingtons, after the actual
brandname of a modern producer of similar poles. Today, however,
with the city glutted by retro corvs in the hundreds, the presence
of truly old ones doesn't make the same impression anymore. |