There is little that we see in the wild world of Williamsburg construction that surprises us. But the gaping void beyond the fence at 40 Berry Street (aka 34 Berry Street) managed to take our breath away. Right behind a gate, there is a two-story drop into a mud pit. The sidewalk is cracked from construction work and there is dirt is crumbling into the void below. We didn’t want to step to hard on the soil because we were afraid enough would give way to cause serious injury. Even thought we couldn’t see it, we have no reason to believe the Berry Street side isn’t shored up like the N. 12 Street side of the excavation, yet the fact that a flimsy, one-quarter open gate has been left in front of deep pit and that such an incredible hazard to safety has been left on a busy sidewalk is remarkable. The site will eventually house a 96,000 square foot rental building designed by Perkin Eastman. Lehman Brothers and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System are among the investors behind the Berry Street Mud Pit of Death new luxury rental building.

GL Analysis:
This conditions on Berry Street are pretty horrifying even by shoddy Williamsburg standards. If there’s anyone at the Department of Buildings who isn’t too occupied trying to explain why cranes keep falling over and smashing into buildings and slaughtering people, they might want to send an inspector over to check on the mess at N. 12 and Berry Street. Falling cranes aren’t the only things that can kill people; it would seem a two-story fall into a mud pit could do the job effectively too. Perhaps things on Wall Street are worse than we thought, if Lehman Brothers and one of the biggest public employee retirement pension funds in the country can’t get rid of a gate that opens to a big hole, put up a real fence and barricade a hazard.

Berry Death Pit–Williamsburg from rsguskind on Vimeo.