Graffiti Pier People
at least a few anyway

 

plus
Checking the shot

 

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December 3, 2017

These three guys looked at me. I looked at them. I raised my arms in a "what?" gesture, and they did the same. My regret: I didn't ask them how the hell they got up onto the eastern viaduct. One of them is holding a skateboard.

 

 

 

 


July 16, 2017
 

 

 

 

 

 


August 6, 2017

He was not amused.  

 

 

 

 

 


April 29, 2018

 

 

 

 

 

 


June 4, 2017

 

 

 

 

 

 


July 23, 2017

 

 

 

 

 


April 24, 2015

 

 

 

 

 

 


February 19, 2017

 

 

 

 

 

 


December 10, 2017

The two homeless guys in sleeping bags were addicts who overnighted at the pier with Eddie Zampitella. Eddie is the guy in the photo below waving from his elevated sleeping spot in the columns of the eastern pier structure. He didn't tell me his last name or that he owned and ran The Last Stop, a well-known drug recovery center, then a storefront on Kensington Avenue in the heart of an infamous drug neighborhood. I learned that online where I also learned Eddie was in trouble with the city for, among other sins, allowing down-and-out people to sleep there despite a zoning ordinance. He slept there himself, but possibly relocated to the pier when the city began enforcing the ordinance. I don't know where he slept after Conrail and Philadelphia police cracked down on Graffiti Pier trespassers in 2018. While Eddie was in residence he kept his area of the pier clear of empty paint cans and other debris. He brought in trash cans and posted signs urging people to use them. He also posted Last Stop signs, some of which are probably still there. According to a March 2019 news story, Eddie settled his differences with the city and moved his recovery center to a new location on Somerset Street.
 


December 10, 2017

 

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