Brooklyn's Billion-Dollar Development Dream, Covered in Poop and Mercury

The reason that people make so much out of the rising of the Gowanus canal in Brooklyn is that 1. it is a cesspool of horror and 2. its banks are the most prime site for development in all of Brooklyn: miles of ancient warehouses, trash yards, parking lots and storage, just waiting to be luxury condos. Luxury condos… that will fill up with poop and cadmium every time there’s a storm surge. Here’s what happened last night, when high tide came. The canal overflooded so much that it drowned the bridges, and the entire block surrounding, turning Bond Street into a river, and beginning to march up to Hoyt Street. The grounds of the enormous forthcoming Whole Foods only flooded mildly last night! Enjoy that.

This video was taken facing Park Slope, from Third Street — and while standing uphill from Bond, which was entirely underwater. If you can make it out, there are two cars underwater, atop the Third Street Bridge — which is one of only three high-trafficked paths across the Gowanus.