This is in the NY Post today. I wonder how the new Casino/Park Development is going to deal with this. Also with the affordable housing down 126th street at the corner of Roosevelt Avenue, how safe are the families going to be? Stealing electricity from city poles and water from the fire hydrants, what kind of damage might that cause. Is this article saying that all these RVs were parked in the middle of the iron triangle off the grid all this time and now are now parked under the Whitestone Expressway. This can end up being very interesting.
Neighborhood regulars said the intruders tap into fire hydrants to bathe and run illegal car washes, auto body and auto repair shops — mostly overnight to avoid harassment from the NYPD.
They live in nearly two dozen rundown RVs, motor homes and campers between 126th Street and 127th Place along Northern Boulevard — with only one of the vehicles seen with a legal license plate.
“The whole area is bad,” said a man who claimed he lived in an RV in Marina Park for eight months. “Real dangerous. Especially at night, real dangerous. Who the f–k is calling the cops?
“They settle things with machetes around here,” he said. “It’s more than a year. It’s not quite two years yet, but it’s more than a year since it started here.”
Residents of the unsightly community declined to comment to The Post, most of them claiming they did not speak English as they roamed the area and slipped into a local liquor store.
Neighbors said the encampment grew out of a row of auto shops and apartments that were displaced by the development of the new $780 million soccer stadium next to Citi Field — with some taking the money from their buyout to move to the Bronx, but others moving under the expressway overpass.
“They started living here full-time little over a year ago,” said Brian Jung, who owns Ryan Auto Inc., a legal shop, on Northern Boulevard. “You can see here they’re opening up the base of the electrical poles and they’re running wires over to do their work and to live in those motor homes.
“In the summertime, yeah, they do they open up all the fire hydrants,” Jung said.
“They open them up, and they just leave them all open, and they take showers. Yeah, it’s kind of wild. It’s been growing but I don’t know how many more they could fit. I guess they could squeeze in a few more.”
Quick RV parking overview for NYC.
- 24-Hour Rule: You cannot leave an RV, trailer, or motor home parked in the same spot on a public street for more than 24 hours.
- Metered Parking: If in a metered space, only the front meter needs to be paid, notes 311 NYC.
- Commercial Registration: RVs with commercial plates are subject to tighter restrictions (often treated as commercial vehicles).
- Residential Areas: Parking is allowed on most streets if it does not violate sanitation, alternate side rules, or block traffic, reports Quora.
- Size Constraints: Extremely large RVs might violate size regulations in certain, narrower, or more dense neighborhoods.
