A Trip Through Seneca Babcock and Surrounding Environs
This website provides some perspectives on the activities and efforts of
the Community Access to Environmental Chemical Analysis project
sponsored by the UB Environment and Society Institute
Environmental Management Alternatives Program.
For further information please contact:
Professor Joseph A. Gardella, Jr., PI
Department of Chemistry, SUNY Buffalo
Buffalo, NY 14260-3000 716-645-6800 X2111, fax: 716-645-5994
http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~gardella
Mail to: gardella@acsu.buffalo.edu
A tour of the neighborhood starts at the center for community activity in the neighborhood: this is where many of the community meetings which focus on input and community education for community access to environmental chemical analysis take place.
The Community Center at Seneca and Wasson
A typical street with housing in the neighborhood
Across the street, however, is the New York State Thruway 190 South Extension
Housing in Seneca Babcock, the Valley, the Old First Ward and Neighborhoods of South Buffalo bordering the Buffalo River are directly adjacent to many industrial sites near the north and south shores of the Buffalo River. In many cases, streets include residential housing which directly border companies and chemical plants. There is no easy border which can be drawn between residential and industrial sites in this region of Buffalo. However, these neighborhoods have a rich history woven within the industrial developments, growth and decline of the past 120 years.
The map below shows the four neighborhoods, the river, the train lines and NYS Thruway I190 Extension and the now vacant "Brownfield" once occupied by Republic Steel, south of the Buffalo River.
In particular, for the UB ESI collaborations, of interest for pollution prevention and chemical analysis efforts, are the three companies which grew from the Schoellkopf Dye Works, first established in 1880. That company, later known as National Aniline, Inc., was sold to Allied Chemical, and then split into its current three separate companies:
Buffalo Color Corporation: A dye manufacturer (largest domestic producer of indigo blue jean dyes)
AlliedSignal's Buffalo Research Laboratory: Research, Development and Pilot Plant for fluorine based chemicals, including national leadership in CFC substitutes and participant in new chemistry for reduction of upper atmosphere ozone depletion (i.e. the Ozone Hole) and new pharmaceutical developments.
PVS Chemical: A producer of Sulfuric Acid and other related chemicals.
All three companies occupy what once was one chemical research and production facility and border the Buffalo River
Seneca Babcock was originally a housing development for employees of National Aniline, The Valley was a neighborhood of workers for the now departed Republic Steel plant, on the south side of the Buffalo River.
Here's some views of AlliedSignal Buffalo Research Laboratory
Here's the Main production portions of Buffalo Color Corp.
Chemical Production on South park Street Lee Street
East of Lee Street
Looking down Lee Street, on the right is PVS on the left is Buffalo Color Corp.
Traveling Away from Buffalo Color, on South Park Street, a Bridge leading over the Buffalo River
Towards the first portion of the
Republic Steel Brownfield Site Redevelopment
A Hydroponic Tomato Farm
One portion of the area which has been reclaimed is the former waste site for National Aniline, the so-called Allied Site D. This has been transformed to Green space as a park at the end of Smith Street in the Valley Neighborhood.
