A few pictures from recent walks around Hudson, mostly Warren St.
Hudson NY
Internet Service in Hudson and the Surrounding Area – more about Mid-Hudson Cable
This offer from Mid-Hudson Cable showed up today in a bank statement from The Bank of Greene County. Mid-Hudson always gets my attention but almost never for good reasons. This ad is a continuation of their finger in your eye approach to customers. Note that it offers “DOUBLE” and “TRIPLE” your speed for Internet service without ever mentioning what it is that they are doubling or tripling. This is simply a further progression in making it hard to find out what exactly you are paying for or even what it is they are promising to provide. If you pop over to their website you can find this (my screen grab from today with added red arrow), that says that the regular residential service package provides “5 meg”. From other advertising I know that this is likely to mean 5 MegaBits/second (MB/sec) a meaningful identifier. Here is the rub. In almost two years of experience with Mid-Hudson I...
Mid-Hudson Cable and Internet Service in Hudson
Last week a story appeared in the Register Star, “Mid-Hudson turns down $3.5M in stimulus money“. This followed by two days Sam Pratt, always at the ready with in depth commentary, who wrote about the continuing failures of Mid-Hudson and the troubled life of a wannabe rural internet user in his blog posting, “MH Cable: Not tapping that grant after all“. Mid-Hudson Cable always gets a rise here. I posted the following comment at Sam’s article: I sympathize with the troubles of those just beyond the reach of high speed Internet. Clearly bringing high speed access to everyone in the county is an important issue. However, the troubles of Mid-Hudson as an Internet provider go beyond their sluggishness at extending service. I live right on Warren St, in the middle of MH’s most densely populated area, and their service level has been poor. They have never lived up to their...
Seen in Hudson on a Morning Walk
A few images from a morning walk. I have taken hundreds of pictures of fire connections. Not sure why. Recently I have only added to this collection when I see a new use for them. Sometimes this is people perching on them. Sometimes they are holding up coffee, beer bottles, candy wrappers…. The City of Hudson clearly doesn’t believe in modern chemistry. Can’t think of the last time I saw so many dandelions. My favorite stairs. Maybe this is just part of a seasonal business’s normal cycle, but?? I know that this is a worn out topic here in Hudson. Nevertheless, I remain amazed at the bad taste of the county government to litter one of the best parks in the city with all of these signs. Why have a ark if you don’t want people to loll in the grass? Is the only purpose of this park to...
Bunnies and Eggs and Other Things Eastery on Warren St.
Karen and I were taking a constitutional up Warren St this past Easter Sunday and noticed that despite the lack of the over the top decorations that seem to accompany every holiday in our country, Easter was not lost on Warren St. Merchants and residents just do up Easter here with more restraint, even delicacy. Apologies for all of the reflections from the glass. I am not that much of a photographer.
Getting things (Up)right in Hudson Signage
The city has been busy with its Spring cleaning. On a recent jaunt up Warren St. I was pleasantly surprised to see two eyesores in the Sixth St. Park at least brought upright and cleaned. The map of the city (mislabeled “directory” earlier) looked so much better that I first thought that it is new. But, on examining the photo from a year ago I have concluded that the glass and map have simply been cleaned. Amazing what a little housekeeping can accomplish. I now am dropping my muttering about the need to tear down these as a sad commentary on our sense of civic pride. They may not be the most graceful public amenities but at least now they look as though someone cares. Kudos to the folks at DPW! before after
Etsy.com Comes to Hudson
The rumors about etsy.com locating a new office in Hudson have been floating about for some time. Yesterday, Rob Kalin, the founder of etsy.com, placed this notice on our local business listserv. Hi all, Please allow me to humbly introduce myself. I know many people here already, and hope to know many more. I’m the founder & CEO of Etsy (www.etsy.com), which I started 6 years ago in my apartment in Brooklyn. My family is from New York (from Tarrytown up to Syracuse), and I’ve spent many a night in a lean-to amongst the Catskills. Etsy currently employs 175 people, most of them in our Brooklyn office. As we continue to grow, it makes a lot of sense to me to open up an office in Hudson. I love the town, we found an incredible building (thank you Chris at the Cannonball Factory, and Theresa at Keystone for helping), and as everyone here knows — better than...
Authenticity in Hudson, NY
authentic |ôˈθentik| (abbr.: auth.) adjective of undisputed origin; genuine : the letter is now accepted as an authentic document | authentic 14th-century furniture. made or done in the traditional or original way, or in a way that faithfully resembles an original : the restaurant serves authentic Italian meals | every detail of the movie was totally authentic. based on facts; accurate or reliable : an authentic depiction of the situation. (in existentialist philosophy) relating to or denoting an emotionally appropriate, significant, purposive, and responsible mode of human life ((definition adapted from Dictionary Version 2.1.1 Apple, Inc.) In part because of the vigorous discussion in the various “Signage” postings in the Hudson Business Coalition discussion group and other discussions I have had recently about Hudson, I have come to think that a major feature of Hudson is authenticity. Hudson demonstrates authenticity in all four senses described in the definition above....
Mayor Scalera’s “Naive or delaying LWRP passage?”
Mayor Scalera’s commentary, “Naive or delaying LWRP passage?” in today’s Register Star requires some comment. Here are my comments posted on the Register Star website. First, Mayor Scalera mis-characterizes the potential uses of the waterfront as “recreational boating and perhaps some limited shipping….”. In fact, from my perspective, and from all of the people I have heard talk about the waterfront, the uses included recreational boating, cruise operations, hotel, restaurants, retail shopping stores, galleries, and more. These uses fit into a larger picture that the future of jobs in Hudson is tied to the extension of the city as an arts, antiques, entertainment, and history destination. This job creation engine has a track record in the city and an obvious future for growth with the addition of the waterfront as part of the overall destination package. The problem is that none of that is possible with a large scale...