One of our readers who is thinking of buying a condo on the near the Roebling Oil field site at N. 11th Street and Roebling in Williamsburg wrote in with some information he had obtained from state Department of Environmental Conservation officials. He wrote in part:

I am considering the purchase of one of the condos on the North side of Roebling, I was rather frantic at reading these posts. Freedom of information is a great thing.

Despite some of the posts on the new developments, these are not multi million dollar apartments. In this instance we are looking for a home, relatively close to city (as we are priced out of NYC & unfortunately do not have wealthy families).

He adds that he spoke with the DEC manager for the site who told him that “the North side soil readings are well within health standard Norms,” which we take to mean the north side of N. 11th Street, and that “the tank on that property was removed in 2000.” We assume this means the ruptured tank that environmental maps show was under the condo known as North 11th & Roebling.

He also says that DEC says that there “is no record of an underground water way under this location,” meaning historic maps of Williamsburg that show old branches of Bushwick Creek running directly beneath the properties and under Union Avenue. There is fairly strong evidence from the maps, however, that this is the case. Whether it has anything to do with the oil is another matter.

Our reader also lists the following points:

• The south side of the street did have high levels of contamination.
• The bulk of the clean up work has been finished BUT not completed.
• They are monitoring drill holes on the North & south side site specifically. They have left a part of the South site uncovered, so as to monitor the soil.
• The oil from the south side did NOT originate from the North side. This was confirmed by the normal reading on the North site.
• The baffling part is where did it come from?
• DEC has a number of drill holes on the North & South side to determine contamination levels.
• Awaiting results….

“Baffling,” in this context, is not a reassuring thing. For those who haven’t followed this story, you can see some photos of the “high levels of contamination” on the south side of the street by clicking here. The test well, like the one pictured above, on the north side of N. 11th Street in front of the N11th & Roebling Condo were drilled very recently. It will be interesting to know if and when state environmental officials figure out the source of the underground Roebling oil.

Related Posts:
Potential Roebling Oil Field Neighbor Says Information Difficult to Obtain
From Where Might the Roebling Oil Have Come?
Roebling Oil Field Update: Drilling Begins