If you're walking in Williamsburg in the next couple of weeks near McCarren Park and see some unusual drilling activity, don't be alarmed. It's just some, uh, testing of the extent of the underground oil near the Roebling Oil Field (see photo). A tipster fills us in:
I was walking by the 'McCarren Park Mews' site the other day and noticed a NY State Department of Enviromental Conservation Spill Response car there. I spoke with three engineer looking guys in big rubber boots coming out of the site back to the car. They said that the smell we have all been sniffing for the last few months is actually from 80 year old creasote soaked piles they are removing from the site. "Oh" I said "so the site doesn't have any oil in it?" Their response..."no it does, lots, but it's just not what you have been smelling." They are going to be doing a bunch of test drilling in the street in a couple of weeks, best guess is the VOC's or Volatile Organic Compounds (aka old oil even though it sounds like a breakfast cereal) have been seeping into the site from an old gas station on the corner of N 11th, Roebling, and Union now the site of those unsalable condos.Should be excellent photo ops.
· Brooklyn Oil Continued, Roebling Edition [Curbed]
· New Williamsburg Condos to Offer Free Oil? [Curbed]