Once again The Bartender’s skills with a Manhatten sends in New York worsts we’d be happy to have as best here. “The Lexington Hotel, The Catskills, New York, one of the oldest resort hotels in the US and a ghost trap for almost a hundred years.” Is this really what constitutes bad over there BSWAM? If so, you’re really making the Ledger thespian hole look even worse. Also some other Lexington shots.They all look fucking awesome to me, including the abandoned car! Dude, what are you doing?
Worst Talk
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The Worst of Perth 
Woah – 3 storeys! What sort of crazy architecture is that? Positively not worst.
Which reminds me, Barkeep – you mentioned Penn Station the other day. While I agree Madison Square Garden is a monstrosity, have a gander at our right-back-at-ya, right on our riverfront.
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The only good thing I can say about Penn Station’s present form is that everybody hates it and the general plan is to tear it down and replace it with something shaped a little less like the engine filter off the top of a 1971 Plymouth.
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Ohh yes, I was going to say looks amazing from photos, but that was the old one long demolished.
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The greatest architectural crime in New York City bar none.
Nationwide, would probably go with the destruction of the Larkin Building in Buffalo by Frank Lloyd Wright.
The loss of the Tiffany Mansion on Long Island to fire was another disaster, although at least the owners salavaged everything they could.
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We would’ve at least kept the front bit of the old building.
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I saw something odd on Googleviews – a classical portico in Perth that’s been retained in front of a glass box-like building. What is the story? The portico is beautifully proportioned but the contrast makes both elements look terrible.
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The facades on lovely old buildings have been kept (facadism?) as a reminder of how we fucked up. The railway hotel on barrack is another. And the worst of all is the Bond Tower which was plunged into the palace hotel, with the facade kept and a bank branch behind the old windows.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palace_Hotel,_Perth
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We’ve got that too–mostly where townhouses are concerned.
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And oddly enough, our most famous example is also the Palace Hotel! Go figure.
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i think the one barkeep refers to is the new court building in hay street.
tla, it was your mate she-ra’s husband who was responsible for the fate of the railway hotel.
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Yes, new District Court. Portico used to belong to a theatre.
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Bondy’s Eighties erection still looks like a cock ‘n’ balls combo to me.
Phallus Hotel, anyone?
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Stupid facadism aside, I quite like the District Court building.
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Same deal with proposed mini-hotel development for Bishop’s House, west end of St Georges Tce. Was in the paper the other day. Don’t know which is worse – knocking flat old building, or po-mo incorporation into new.
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For my money one of the worst heritage adaptations is the old “Rigbys” which is actually inside the Forrest Centre next to 197 SGT. A reversal of the usual concrete tower behind a heritage facade. I am not sure why the building was thought worth saving or whether it is on its original site.
The dizzo building is strikingly terrible too.
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Barracks Arch too.
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We do have a worse convention centre than this one, bad though it is.
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I think the Javits is actually underrated. Given that the client pulled the carpet out from under the architect’s feet, the building is actually a fairly grand piece of High Tech-shifting-into-Po-Mo work.
It is, however, is a shocking state of disrepair. And it is in what I consider to be the ugliest and most inhospitable neighborhood in Manhattan and one of the ugliest in the city.
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Soviet style housing is a good description of St George’s Terrace.
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That light blue car would be a 1961 Plymouth Valiant, which of course became the transplanted in RHD as the Chrysler Valiant R Series, which graced our shores in January 1962.
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At least that one isn’t overheating.
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AP5!!
The whole town is abandoned? HP Lovecraft FTW
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That was kind of where I was going with it.
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Bit too far south for Innsmouth, surely?
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Love that story.
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Lovecraft’s best IMO.
“The Lurking Fear” is set in the Hudson River Valley. The Storm King Mountain actually exists and is a genuinely forbidding place, surrounded by a national park on one side and the military reserve of West Point Academy on the other. A more sinister place anywhere would be hard to imagine.
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The most merciful thing in the world I think is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents … or Rockingham. Where is JJ?
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On a vaguely related note, TBswaM, I’m considering taking the Lake Shore Limited from Chicago to NY in late April – early May. Yes, no, maybe ? Is its nickname the Late for sure Limited well deserved ? Any recommendations or warnings would be much appreciated.
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Scrub that, TBswaM. We had a meeting tonight and put the kybosh on that. We’ll fly.
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Damn! I’ve heard mixed things about that train. Either it’s Hell on Wheels or a Romantic Throwback to the Golden Age of Rail Travel. Or both, which is probably closest to the mark.
Anyway, feel free to look me up when you’re in Gotham. I trust I can find a few suitable worsts to amuse you with.
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If only HPL had known about Rockingham. Wait: a new Winton/HPL pastiche suggests itself.
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Well put TLA. I was worried for you after the recent Steve Priest incident, but copy on this and CHD has reassured me no end. Not worst, unless Manhatten can supply further context and suggest why not.
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It’s a bit like the bad british Architecture blog. A lot of that shit we would be happy to have.
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Really? Because I know that site pretty well, and the crap on it seems pretty heinous to me.
I only know Perth through Googleviews, but the downtown doesn’t seem all that bad.
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More like, most of the stuff on there, wouldn’t be highlighted as really bad. just the sort of ordinary stuff that gets built here. Take the last post (it will be the last, because the guy got exposed as the blogger)
http://badbritisharchitecture.blogspot.com/2010/04/blade-building-reading-by-sheppard.html
We wouldn’t be calling that super bad. We’d just be grateful it wasn’t a rectangular box done on the cheap.
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I have to admit that I thought that one looked rather nice. The blade effect is silly but the staircase is beautiful and overall it looks like a quality piece of construction very much in the Miesian tradition (which the Brits are not overly fond of).
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What prevented him from continuing the blog? I thought it was great.
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Kieran Long, Architecture critic for the Evening Standard in The UK. It was anonymous, but it got found out that it was him.
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Ah.
Embarrasing.
But I appreciate his efforts.
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Not worst, especially the TorqueFlite. For mine, the best looking Valiant ever.
Wait. Speed limit 30 ! I take it all back.
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30 MPH = 48.28032 KPH, close enough to our own speed limit in built up areas.
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It’s LESS than 50ks. Doesn’t matter how much less.
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speed limit should be reduced to 30kmh, like many german urban areas
In lexington the only thing to hit are zombies – so very similar to Perth really
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“Sorry Officer, I thought I was doing well under 48.28032 kph.”
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Don’t mind me. I’m just nostalgic for the days when the Territory had no limit on the highways between towns, although I do like the CLP’s hilarious concern about fatigue-related fatalities. More to the point, as a card carrying member of the Franz Reichelt Motorcycle Club, I’m just cranky that I have to watch my step until August when my demerit points square up.
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I remember voting no in the referendum to statehood because then we would have speed limits on the highways. Actually I voted no because if the native territorians were so stoopid as to make that a reason to vote no for statehood, they didn’t deserve statehood.
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We might as well give Tasmania statehood if NT is going to get it. What next, international year of the woman?
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I’ve often thought of myself as the Chief Enforcer of The Subcommittee For The Metrification Of Song Lyrics Board…imagine the possibilities!
“I will walk eight-hundred-and-foor-point-six-seven-two kilometres, and I will walk eight-hundred-and-foor-point-six-seven-two more,
Just to be the man that walked one thoosand-six-hundred-and-nine-point-three-foor-foor kilometres to fall down at your door”
“…All I need is five-hundred-and-sixty-eight-point-two-six-one-two-five millilitres a day, if we ever get out of here…”
“Give two-point-five-four centimetres, take ninety-one-point-four-four, take it all”.
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Which is at least 30 km/hr faster than most Perth urban motor vehicle operators (you can’t justifiably refer to them as drivers) are reasonably capable of guiding their pretentious chariots.
Sleep deprivation being recouped whilst in the driving seat of a car.
Young cunts included.
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The Torqueflite (904 & 727 versions) were considered the strongest and smoothest transmissios their day, bettered only by the Mercedes Benz 4 sp auto. Pretty sure thats a ’60 Plymouth Valiant, also marketed as a Dodge lancer, same body with different trimmings. The U.S. Market also got coupe and convertible versions. One of the coolest looking cars of all time. Totally not worst.
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For sure, EV, and BO’T. Beautiful. Although I definitely prefer the front end on the Valiant to the Lancer.
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This time, maybe.
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You can delete that thumbnail if you like, TLA. This is the 600 pixel shot of the Valiant I was trying to post.
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They were pretty suave, especially for Detroit metal of that era.
The effect that importing the design of the Plymouth Valiant for Chrysler Australia had a very significant impact on the local automotive industry: prior to this, Aussies were prepared to have outdated designs of motor cars, with barely adequately powered engines (the Ford Falcon, which was also a US “compact” car like the Valiant, helped bring modern streamlined design to our roads in 1960, which showed up the contemporaneous FB Holden as dated with its fins and doglegged windscreen, still was very modestly powered, only having a 2.3 L/144 c.i. six at first), but when the Valiant broke cover with its curvaceous R Series at the beginning of 1962, it proved a sensation, the allocated 1008 cars selling out within weeks, to be superseded by the similar less elaborate S Series, all of just over 10000 which too sold very well.
The other attractive elements that were even more important than its winning looks were both its drivetrain with a powerful motor, the 225 c.i./3.7 L “slant” six coupled to a three-speed Torqueflite automatic gearbox, and its competitive price, being not much more than either the Holden or Falcon, but getting and arguably better car.
These were a huge wake-up call to to not only GM-H and Ford Australia, which would both continue to be left in Chrysler Australia’s wake throughout the remainder of the 60s in regards to innovations (like V8 and Hemi 6 power, suspension and Torqueflite automatics), durability, quality and keen pricing, but also opened up the possibility of other car manufacturers from America, Britain, Europe and the newly-ascendant Japan of competing against the (then) dominance of The General, which in 1957 had over half of the local market to itself, with a single-model, four-bodystyle range and still commanded about 40% by 1969.
The Australian automotive scene was forever altered by the arrival of both the Falcon and Valiant. Sure, the Val may have disappeared in 1981 and its successor, Mitsubishi, abandoned local manufacture in 2008 and its now Toyota that is the dominant brand in Australia, with daylight then Holden next. But I believe it was the Chrysler that had a greater impact, for it spurred on a virtuous circle of rapid improvement not only upon Holden and Ford, but also anyone else who wanted a slice of the Australian motoring pie, of which we’ve become one of the most competitive and testing markets for any marque anywhere.
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It’s a bit like “Silent Hill” except with snow rather than ash, and fewer zombies.
The Valley is studded with communities like these that were once fashionable resorts of the Civil War era and which have spent the last 150 years sinking into a quagmire of fading social cachet and non-existant economics. I was literally the only person out and about in the village the Sunday afternoon I took these.
Ugly is as ugly does, but something once beautiful left to decay can be a worst too, I think.
On the other hand, the locals will never tell you how vibrant anything is. So. I guess there’s an upside.
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Vibrant s just another word for nothing left to lose .
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Or let me put it this way:
Charming Victorian village, full of landmark architecture, free to whoever feels like climbing to the top of Mount Doom and moving in. Enjoy lovely views, peace and quiet like the grave, unspoiled forests full of pack wolves and serial killers and the odd lurching revenant! Cold water only, mostly through the roof.
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Still. Sounds. Great.
Wolves? Lovely.
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Sounds like Adelaide.
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Sounds much like my home town if you minus the wolves…
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I think the snow makes it Worst.
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That looks like a good hotel, i want to go there and where is Lexington by the way?
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Dude, I’m not confident you could even find your way to the airport, let alone Lexington. Perhaps just stick to exploring Dianella and Bunbury for now. Baby steps.
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HAVE ADDED MORE PICS.
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Almost reminds me of the sight gag (very effectual when I was TL101’s age back in the late 80s) of some of the neon letter tubes being shorted out on the sign for “Hotel Coral Essex” in Revenge Of The Nerds II: Nerds In Paradise (about only funny for horny teenage boys), in what was an ultimately successful means of attracting means of luring clientele to its doors.
Doubt there’s any LEXINGTON HOT_Is there, for I don’t think that’s where a certain pornostar’s studios are.
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Actually, take away the snow and it could be Tasmania. Fingal, perhaps, or maybe an old Hydro town.
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Beautiful.
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I think i can find me way to the airport i know perth, Anyone could find Lexington now i know where it is.
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me old mate Patti Patti was in Inside Cover today
she has broken cover to announce she will be shaving her head again for charity
in recognition of her commitment I am prepared to donate $1000, but only if she has it done by a sheep shearer. I want to see her with her neck wedged between the knees of a big bloke in a blue singlet with the crack of his arse showing out the top of his pants
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She’s so in need of a raised profile, I won’t be surprised if she takes you up on that.
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more coverage on inside cover today with some law firm pledging a grand and Ashead starting to spruik it.
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I was half expecting them to call your bluff with the shearer offer.
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I too read the first half of that piece and expected to see my name
it’s no bluff, I’m serious
$2000 if the shearer does the crutching as well.
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and some poor bugger will have to photograph this?
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I have a camera
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and a strong stomach?
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You reckon that was the image slim was trying to evoke?
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Not worse. Looks like a great place to explore.
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All this mindless chatter, and no-one has asked:
What happens in the Tap Room???
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Jack has a little talk with Lloyd about Wendy.
She’s driving him bonkers.
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Reminds me of my home town. Of course, the thing that doesn’t remind me of Frankland is that the roads have been plowed. Councils, actually maintain roads in a minority area? Pfffft.
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