New Yorkers Can Adopt Buildings In Queens Museum's Miniature City
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Anyone who wants to own a famous New York landmark now has a chance, thanks to a program to help maintain one of the city's hidden gems, the Panorama of the City of New York in the Queens Museum of Art. NY1's Roger Clark filed the following report. Driving on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, it's hard to miss the eight giant Digester Eggs at the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, which process up to 1.5 million gallons of sludge everyday.
"They're 145 feet tall and help process that dry waste or solid dry air waste called 'sludge' that is produced by all of us and processed in our waste water treatment plant," said Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Carter Strickland.
Now the eggs can be seen in another form -- miniaturized -- as part of the Panorama of the City of New York, the massive scale model of New York City at the Queens Museum of Art built for the 1964-1965 World's Fair.
The eggs were added to the scale-model city as part of the Queens Museum's "Adopt A Building" program.
"I think they are as beautiful in miniature as they are in real life, they are a low-luster stainless steel," said Strickland.
The miniature version is about 4.5 inches long and made of balsa wood. It joins other recent additions through the Adopt A Building program, including Brooklyn Bridge Park and Battery Park City.
Participants can adopt an apartment, the house they grew up in, or iconic structures like the Empire State Building. Levels range from $50 to $10,000.
"All of the proceeds of the program go towards the care and maintenance of the panorama," said Queens Museum of Art Executive Director Tom Finkelpearl.
It is one of the highlights of the museum, which remains open during an expansion project which will double its size by fall 2013. But the panorama will always remain a focal point.
"We have a very busy school tour program all year long and there's the oohs and the ahs, every single day. Every tour group that comes in here, 'Oh my gosh, I can't believe how big it is,'" said Finkelpearl.
For more information on the Queens Museum's Adopt A Building Program, visit QueensMuseum.org.