It’s not steam. It’s smoke from wood fired pizza ovens for the turtle men that live there. There was a cartoon documentary about them on tv a few years back.
Why is there steam coming out of the streets in New York
Submitted 1 month ago by kunegis@feddit.org to nostupidquestions@lemmy.world
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Comments
pacology@lemmy.world 1 month ago
jaybone@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
I never thought of them eating artisan pizzas. I always figured they’d get some shitty dominos.
SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Ew, gross. They live in a sewer, but they’re not animals.
ieatpwns@lemmy.world 1 month ago
They wouldn’t do dominos they’d probably get a variation of Rays famous near them
Someonelol@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
They seem to have the only people willing to deliver to a drainage hole.
Kaiserschmarrn@feddit.org 1 month ago
surewhynotlem@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I love how plausible this is
Agent641@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Praise Cheesus
MacNCheezus@lemmy.today 1 month ago
Thank you, much a-brie-ciated.
verdantbanana@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The New York City steam system includes Con Edison’s Steam Operations, a piped steam system which provides steam to large parts of Manhattan. Other smaller systems provide steam to New York University and Columbia University, and many individual buildings in New York City also have their own steam systems. The steam is used to heat and cool buildings and for cleaning and disinfecting. It is the largest such system in the world and has been in operation since 1882.
AA5B@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Wow, that was quite a read, thanks. Amazing technology
ieatpwns@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Amazing for the 1800s
jaxxed@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
Whole parts of Eastern Europe still transport Steam for heating.
Infynis@midwest.social 1 month ago
We have these in Lansing MI too! Part of the Satanic Panic back in the 80s involved kids playing D&D down in parts of the steam tunnels under MSU, which, I’m told, is much harder to do now unfortunately
BoulevardBlvd@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 month ago
We have these in Lansing MI too! Part of the Satanic Panic back in the 80s involved kids playing D&D down in parts of the steam tunnels under MSU, which, I’m told, is much harder to do now ~unfortunately~ very fortunately since children don’t know how to look out for a superheated steam leak and it was only a matter of time before a child got fucking bisected
Ftfy
Digestive_Biscuit@feddit.uk 1 month ago
Wow this makes me realise why so many movies set in New York I watched in the 80’s and 90’s often had steam coming up from the ground.
PillowTalk420@lemmy.world 1 month ago
That’s just toxic gas bubbling up from the ruins of Old New York that New York is built on top of. The mutants down there are a steampunk society.
Septimaeus@infosec.pub 1 month ago
Old steam heating system. They vent it when they’re working on a section.
Side-note: surprised by all the fellow New Yorkers i’m seeing in this thread. I thought yous were still at the other place.
DelightfullyDivisive@discuss.online 1 month ago
Yep. Detroit has this, too.
Septimaeus@infosec.pub 1 month ago
Yeah it’s common enough I figured most knew, but a few years ago I went ice skating at the bryant park rink with this girl who refused to walk anywhere near the steam. She thought they were toxic and didn’t accept my explanation, so we had to walk an extra few blocks to get around the steam work. Shrug
TBi@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I wonder if they could make it more efficient by running at a lower temperature and installing water source heat pumps in buildings. youtu.be/abGiNL9IT54
Septimaeus@infosec.pub 1 month ago
That’s a good idea! My understanding is that the old stream network is slated for decommission and replacement by this program, basically a large distributed geothermal heat pump network that also harvests from major heat producers like data centers and provides both heating and cooling.
It will end the era of the steamy-street Sin City aesthetic but should be many, many times more efficient than the old steam system. Phase-change thermal transfer in HVAC systems is currently as much as 400% more efficient than the theoretical limit of direct heating, because it only uses the energy necessary to move heat from one place to another rather than produce it, and it works for both heating and cooling.
Right now I believe they’re piloting the system in NYCHA buildings (public housing) of neighborhoods outside the old steam network, like Chelsea and Hell’s Kitchen, but supposedly the plan is to expand to the rest of Manhattan.
Shardikprime@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Steam from the steamed hams we’re having
habitualcynic@lemmy.world 1 month ago
And you call them that even though they are obviously grilled?
kSPvhmTOlwvMd7Y7E@lemmy.world 1 month ago
excuse me for a minute
RideAgainstTheLizard@slrpnk.net 1 month ago
New sewer pope
TrojanRoomCoffeePot@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Cocopanda@futurology.today 1 month ago
Believe it or not. Very old infrastructure in the city. Still runs on steam power.
ByteJunk@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I swear I thought this answer was about as accurate as the one that said “dragons”.
How steampunk for probably the largest city in the world to use steam in this day and age? I love it…
PanArab@lemm.ee 1 month ago
I’m going to have to interject, NYC is the 11th largest city.
Hikermick@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Some big cities originally heated their buildings by producing steam in one one centralized building and delivering it to large buildings thru pipes underground. The steam you see is from leaking pipes in this antiquated infrastructure. It’s a very inefficient method if you ask me. Cities should offer these buildings low interest loans so they can update and be independent but they never take my advice
Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee 1 month ago
Afaik it’s not inefficient if the heating is done via fossil fuels as big furnaces (especially in the past, especially turbo-fan super-fine grind coal ones) are much more efficient than smol ones for individual buildings (even if the buildings are giant).
Hikermick@lemmy.world 1 month ago
It’s terribly inefficient. The efficiency is lost when the steam that condenses back into hot water is lost and none of it is returned to the boiler to be reheated. Rather than reheating this returning water which normally is at 120-160 degrees Fahrenheit, fresh water is used which in the winter here is around 56 degrees. Aside from this the cold water taken in contains impurities such as dissolved gasses which cause corrosion and dissolved minerals which can cause scaling that acts as an insulator raising the amount of energy needed to heat the water.
Wahots@pawb.social 1 month ago
District level heating is actually pretty efficient, some universities do the same thing on purpose to save on bills. Our relatively young city does it with the downtown skyscrapers for the same reason.
The other nice thing is that when you upgrade the heating system to be less carbon intensive, you can instantly have a ton of buildings all jump instantly to fewer emissions too.
dickalan@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Boy, I sure love it when dip shits act like they’re from Reddit and talk about stuff they know absolutely nothing about, why don’t you shove your foot in your mouth and stop typing
_stranger_@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Why not just have the city mandate the upgrades and then implement them? It’s probably not that big of a problem for everyone involved.
Hikermick@lemmy.world 1 month ago
If it were that simple everyone would have done it by now. This method of heating your building is very expensive. Long story short, I’m in the HVAC business and two of my customers have made themselves independent. One was a private property management company that gutted an empty building and was successful, the other is a federal building that hired a private company to convert over and got screwed.
SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 1 month ago
That’s the steam from the melting pot
pwalshj@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The tubes are there to raise minor steam leaks above street level so they don’t hinder visibility.
Another interesting underground quirk we have is our pneumatic tube mail system.
FearMeAndDecay@literature.cafe 1 month ago
Wait those pneumatic tube things are real?? I always thought it was like 1960s sci-fi. Like what they thought the future would be like
exasperation@lemm.ee 1 month ago
It was the fastest way to get original physical documents from one side/floor of the building to another.
When I was a kid that was the standard way that banking drive throughs worked, too. You’d drive up to the multi-lane drive through, each station would have a pneumatic tube for handing off cash or checks or receipts between the car and the teller in the window. It pretty much ended when ATMs could start handling cash and checks.
CarbonatedPastaSauce@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Those things used to be on every single bank drive-up teller booth in the 80’s and 90’s.
grue@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Haha Roosevelt Island trash system go pshew
Bezier@suppo.fi 1 month ago
I like the term “clogged mail”
schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 1 month ago
That isn’t steam, it’s smoke. Smoke from the smoked hams we’re having. Mmmm, smoked hams.
son_named_bort@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I thought that was from the streets of Albany?
schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 1 month ago
no, there it was the other way round, pay attention
samus12345@lemm.ee 1 month ago
Surely you mean smoked clams?
FiskFisk33@startrek.website 1 month ago
There’s a really good explanation here:
Sequentialsilence@lemmy.world 1 month ago
There’s a lot of things under the streets of New York, many of them cause heat. In order to cool them off the heat is vented outside and the warm moist air meets with the cool dry air and condensates into droplets that we see as steam. Same affect as breathing out on a cold day, you’re not creating steam but it looks that way because the warm moist air from your breath is condensing in the cool dry air.
dysprosium@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
Could you name one thing that would cause heat under streets? It’s kinda hard to believe tbh
Coreidan@lemmy.world 1 month ago
When you take a hot shower where do you think that water is going?
Notorious_handholder@lemmy.world 1 month ago
You know how when rocks take off in Florida there’s lots of smoke?
Yeah there’s a tunnel that goes from Florida to New York that the smoke goes through to help heat up the New York streets. So anytime you see smoke in New York it’s cause a rocket was recently shot up in Florida.
TechnologyInfrastructure is incredible!IndustryStandard@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Teenage mutant ninja turtles barbeque
h3mlocke@lemm.ee 1 month ago
Hot. Moist. Air.
supercriticalcheese@lemmy.world 1 month ago
it’s steam not air
h3mlocke@lemm.ee 1 month ago
No it is Moist. Air.
Dearth@lemmy.world 1 month ago
You can’t see steam. It’s not visible to the naked eye.
Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The CHUDs are having a BBQ. Guess the markets closed for the day.
mojofrododojo@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I think it’s important, at this point, to differentiate between NYC CHUDs, and your common racist shitbag chud. NYC CHUDs are many things, but not racist dickbags.
Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I’m just referencing the movie, but if you think that there not racists in NYC, you haven’t talk to enough New Yorkers.
daggermoon@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Volcano under the city
MehBlah@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Hundred plus year old infrastructure.
Proprietary_Blend@lemmy.world 1 month ago
That’s not smoke. It’s a space station.
edgemaster72@lemmy.world 1 month ago
That’s no moon, it’s… oh, wait… shit.
gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
Wrong answers only:
VinesNFluff@pawb.social 1 month ago
From the Steamed Clams we’re having. Mmmmmmm, Steamed Clams!
Agent641@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Illegal underground gay saunas
gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
german techno beats intensify
Quibblekrust@thelemmy.club 1 month ago
Rat farts.
gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
MacNCheezus@lemmy.today 1 month ago
They smoking dope down there
Rosscameron@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Ah yes, the classic New York fog machine. Turns out it’s not for dramatic effect—just the city’s 19th-century steam system still doing its thing. Who needs modern infrastructure when you’ve got built-in Gotham vibes?
Cornpop@lemmy.world 1 month ago
They use a lot of steam for heating still
Gerudo@lemm.ee 1 month ago
They outlawed chem trails so they had to change tactics.
Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 1 month ago
It’s the ancient horrors beyond description, that are buried underneath the city, that are having indigestion.
leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 month ago
It’s where they store the chemtrails before putting them in planes.
RangerJosey@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
There’s C.H.U.D.s down there....https://youtu.be/BJckCjZ8Tdw?si=mv2SGgDh…
DarkCloud@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Sewer mutants cooking up some grub.
dhork@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Ooh. I know this one. Parts of NYC still use a steam heating system that was first designed in the late 1800’s:
en.m.wikipedia.org/…/New_York_City_steam_system
disguy_ovahea@lemmy.world 1 month ago
You should tell this guy.
youtube.com/shorts/_MAXlkWLpfM
anzo@programming.dev 5 weeks ago
Imagine having two keyboards just to put your hands in each of them and, like play 4 keys from each… without moving your arms at all…
Digestive_Biscuit@feddit.uk 1 month ago
Thank you. There’s so many people responding with unhelpful answers.
Proprietary_Blend@lemmy.world 1 month ago
rothaine@lemm.ee 1 month ago
Wow that’s neat
MrPoletki@feddit.uk 1 month ago
No, that’s heat.