the escape way mystery...

On wednesday I go to Rikers for a sharing group. We read the readings of the upcoming Sunday and talk about it. It's a very good time for all.
Today I went, as every wednesday, but there was yet an other alarm and the whole building was shut down. Of course no one told me until I actually reached the building..
Anyway I wanted to share something much less spiritual. One of the first time I got on the island I noticed a pedestrian bridge across the bay, a straight line between Laguardia Airport and the outer fence of the parking outside of Rikers. It seemed a little weird to me..
Why would one build (or leave) a BRIDGE that goes STRAIGHT from the prison to the airport. I know New York City takes its pride in having the "boldest" officers, but that's a little pushing it, isn't it?
The bridge I'm so intrigued by is small, big enough only for one or two men standing together, made of wood or some other light construction material and it ends about 5 feets away from both sides. It's a bridge that goes from water to water, but SO close to both sides! It's fully equipped with lights. For security I guessed. My explanation so far was: hmm maybe because the island was a garbage deposit they did a direct bridge to get there from Queens... Then I don't know which one appeared first : prison or airport but they must have cut the ends of the bridge... But then why such a small bridge? And why just cut the ends, and not destroy it all?


See for yourself: above is a picture from a landing plane, where you can see the landing lanes (the long white straight line on the right, white is because of the snow on that day), and on the top right of it is Rikers Island (the whitish elipse).
Ok this is a bad picture but now you know what is where, and you won't think this one is quite as bad..

Once again you can see the long runways (like a big cross on the ground) and very close by you see the island.Now look closer, you should see both bridges.

here is my poor highlight of the thing... Green is the main bridge, the only access to Rikers by ground transportation. No pedestrian allowed, only buses, trucks and cars. In pink is the mysterious pedestrian bridge that starts and ends in water..

Such a mystery to me. I was making movies in my head.. have you ever seen The Rock, with Sean Connery? I could see some adventurous escape, with a tiny plane waiting on runway 4-22... tatada..

And last week my movie ended short. There was fog, the atmosphere was so humid and heavy. It was only 8AM. On the bus ride to Rikers it all came clear. While passing on the bridge above the narrow one I saw the lights on. Not regular security lights. Airport lights. This "pedestrian bridge" is a row of lights for the runway!!

LOL it's just the lights for the planes to visualize where to land when it rains, snows, fogs or more...
Oh well I had a couple good movies in the meantime. :)