By: Rusty Brooks

One of New York City’s longest-standing city-owned scaffolding sheds at 2720 Broadway on the Upper West Side has finally begun to come down — but only partially, months after the New York Post revealed it was among roughly 500 such sheds on city-owned buildings across the city.

The scaffolding shed, originally erected in 2012, was removed from the Broadway frontage on June 18, ending more than 10 years of eyesore and inconvenience for local residents and businesses. However, the scaffolding still remains around the corner on West 104th Street, complete with a fenced-off area full of porta-potties and construction equipment blocking half the street, NY Post reported.

The partial removal has done little to ease frustrations for those living and working in the area, as the problematic scaffolding — often associated with a decline in neighborhood cleanliness and a magnet for homeless encampments — now simply shifts location by a few dozen feet.

To add insult to injury, just days after the Broadway section of scaffolding was dismantled, a large new shed went up on a neighboring building, continuing the presence of these unsightly and disruptive structures along the block.

Local business owners and residents expressed their anger at the ongoing situation. Fernando Andrade, a cobbler whose shop Andrade Andrade General Shoe Repair is now mired in the new scaffolding, told the New York Post, “When this disappears, I am so happy… finally, now it is more clean. It might come back, the neighborhood from how it was before. But immediately they put it back up. I am scared for that because we don’t know how long this might be. I hope very not too long, no. I hope.”

Ali Abdul, who works at a nearby bodega, also voiced concern over the sheds, saying, “It doesn’t make any sense. Now they sleep under here. Nighttime, people sleep, two or three homeless.”

These sheds are located just a block away from West End Avenue, one of the city’s worst stretches for scaffolding. A New York Post investigation last year found that along a 35-block stretch, only two buildings were without scaffolding, underscoring the scale of the problem.

Residents lament the endless cycle of sheds coming down only to be quickly replaced — a frustrating “whack-a-mole” game they see played out on their streets.

“We were elated, thinking, ‘Oh, good!’ And within a matter of weeks it was put back up again. It’s been dreadful,” said 73-year-old neighbor Linda Wright. “It’s created all kinds of problems in terms of maintaining the cleanliness of the area. It’s become basically a shelter for the homeless and so on. So it’s been a real nuisance. It stinks. It’s unconscionable. I don’t know what more I could say.”

The remaining scaffolding on Broadway is expected to come down in August, the Department of Design and Construction told the Post, explaining that façade work on the building’s south face — where the shed still stands — was delayed due to late deliveries of stone required for the historically accurate restoration.

However, some residents are skeptical about the lengthy timeline. Michael Dulin, who runs a business called BeFitNYC on the second floor of the building, said, “We’ve been waiting, we moved in here ten years ago, and we’ve been waiting. We were told the scaffolding was going to come down in a couple of weeks. It’s been here for ten years. It’s ridiculous.”