Photo of the scene this morning, courtesy of Jerome Barth/BPC
Late last month the shoe shine booth, located on 42nd Street near 5th Avenue and owned by the Bryant Park Corporation, was torched in the middle of the night. This morning we heard rumblings that the same exact thing happened, and Jerome Barth at the BPC just confirmed with us that around 1:30 a.m. someone set fire to the replacement booth. Sigh.
Barth told us, "It is awful and extremely annoying. We hope the police will catch the perpetrator and put that person away." In the meantime, they plan to build a new unit or repair the torched stand so they can continue offering the service.
