Photo of protest at 73rd and West End by Joy Bergmann.
A protest wound through the Upper West Side around 2 a.m. on Wednesday, calling out Black Lives Matter chants.
“They were playing messages over a bull horn and DJ noises, amplified, saying ‘Get hype, get ready, we’re hyped, we’re ready,'” wrote one reader who was awoken by the chants on 73rd Street around 2 a.m. in an email to West Side Rag. She said the amplified sound was startling, because most Black Lives Matter haven’t used amplification.
A protester told Rag reporter Joy Bergmann that they’d been marching all day, all over the city. About 6 police officers on motorcycles plus two units trailed them from a block away.
Photo by Jackie.
In addition — and potentially completely unrelated — a police cruiser was found burned and otherwise damaged on West 83rd Street between Columbus and CPW near the 20th precinct. Investigators called the fire suspicious, according to ABC News. “They say the front driver’s side window was broken, and there is evidence an accelerant was used,” ABC reported. “No one was in the cruiser at the time of the fire, and no injuries were reported.”
We’ve reached out to the 20th precinct for more information.
Unrelated I doubt that
NYPost reported that the 73-rd street protest was a disturbance by NYPD commissioner’s home…
Maybe don’t treat the neighborhood like downtown Baghdad with all the barriers and limits on movement and stealing all the street parking and other BS and people won’t torch your cars?
Not sure what limits to movement you are talking about. How about protesting in the neighborhood you live in and not in ours
Sometimes I really feel like I live among idiots who lack any rational thought processes.
Not idiots. Die-hard progessive liberals who excuse any negative actions done by people that are not white. White people are evil, and are to blame for everything. Then you have Communists who literally hate America and want Capitalism abolished. Not. Idiots. Remember, Hitler was mocked as “the screaming little man with the silly moustache”. This is the most dangerous time for the USA since 1861.
Do you really need to constantly bring up Hitler and/or the Holocaust to make your points??
Why does that always have to be your go-to reference? Is calling everyone Communists and Nazis your version of being “woke”?
There is an old expression…something about how when you only have a hammer, everything looks like a nail….
Anyway, give it a rest already.
Re: “…give it a rest already.”
Give it a rest??? NO…No Way!
Not when we are seeing Trump/Barr/McConnell/etc. edging the U.S. further into a Dictatorship!
Just today Trump got the attention he seeks by “suggesting” the election should be DELAYED “until people can properly, securely and safely vote.”
As another website warns, “that Election Day would be the second Tuesday after never.”
Where is our Paul Revere to warn us NOT that “the British are coming!” BUT that ‘the Fascist Dictatorship is coming!’
I rarely bring up those aspects of history, but you always seem so bothered by my doing so. I wonder why…I will never, ever rest on railing against the evils of Communism and the oxymoronic “Antifa”.
Spot on. Wake up people.
Ah, I get it. A frustrated commuter, after a long day of work, can’t find a parking spot. See a police car. Torch it. It evaporates. Parking spot – secured!
Real-life Grand Theft Auto, Level 9.
Are you saying that torching cars is an appropriate means of resolution for disputes involving parking?
Wow, you’re right. The barriers and lost parking spaces justify torching public property. I had the relationship the other way around. I didn’t see it through the downtown-Baghdad lens.
Sounds like another “peaceful” protest when local residents have the right to sleep and rest.
https://nypost.com/2020/07/29/nypd-commissioner-gets-early-morning-visit-from-protesters/
This woke me up and has ruined my day. Perhaps these folks could consider running for office instead of destroying their neighbors quality of life.
You know what really ruins a day?! Being woken up to news that a fellow human has been hurt or murdered by the police. Be angry about that.
No matter what you do there will be always be good and bad in everything. You will never change that…now terrorizing neighborhoods may make you feel better but I assure you it won’t end well. These are attempts to divide us, black and white, to start racial wars. Look at who funds these groups and where those fund go to and you will begin to understand what is truly happening. Don’t be a pawn or a puppet for those that want to keep power and control.
“You know what really ruins a day” comment is pretty silly. How is any “murder by cops” prevented by waking up little kids and old folks in the middle of the night? In fact, all the protestors did was establish that they were discourteous and had poor judgment. How does that sway anyone to the protestors’ cause?
Why not both?
The wrong tactics can prevent the achievement of a worthy goal.
Didn’t you know that every time you virtue signal an angel gets it’s wings. Lots of angels around these days.
Dumb perspective
While gang members murder each other at one end of the neighborhood, BLM protesters disrupt joyfully disrupt sleeping residents and police vehicles burn at the other end. You voted for anarchy, and now you have it.
“Anarchy.” Dear God. The spoiled, coddled nature of the aging UWS racist has never been more obvious.
Doesn’t a protest with amplification require a permit? I’d be furious to have been awakened by that.
You should save your energy and anger for something worthwhile. Be furious when you’re awakened by the news that another corrupt cop has hurt or murdered your fellow human being.
Not following. Because you are angry about certain conduct by police, it is therefore justified for you to annoy or yell at folks who are not police?
Moral preen, much?
You should save your energy and anger for something worthwhile. Be furious when you’re awakened by the news that a 1 year old was shot in the chest and killed.
why you say “unrelated” ?? That’s their MO
“and potentially completely unrelated”
Right, I’m sure it had absolutely nothing to do with the protest.
Yeah Uncle Leo, all those peaceful protesters being trailed by the police went 3/4 miles away a couple hours later to torch a car.
We were woken up by this protest at 2am last night. It should be noted that our family supports the importance of raising awareness, as well as the message of BLM – long overdue! But is it really necessary to do this in the middle of the night? Is this a movement or a meandering caravan of malcontents with a bullhorn?
“Ten degrees to the left of center in good times, ten degrees to the right of center if it affects me personally.”
I think I’ve heard this song before.
How long before it is determined that the burned cruiser was torched by white supremacist provocateurs? 3..2..1…
May lightning bolts of the true creators angels clear out the dark clouds of controlled chaos and let the sunshine of Christ protect all of you reading this. If they cared about all people of color, there would be a pro peace movement recognizing lives lost overseas. May the creator intervene and this prayer grow with collective intention.
legitimate question – do i bring my kids back to NYC for the fall? i dont have too… i can work remote. crime is picking up. i dont need to be awoken at random hours of the night. I dont need an expensive NYC offering nothing these days. is there a reason to come back from our beach place? I dont see the appeal of NYC anymore.. its expensive, crime is up, everything is closed – is there a reason for families to come back? this city is toast if families dont return.. the tax base is gonezo.
We need you back here! Don’t give up on NYC. The local restaurants depend on your spending and soon enough the museums will get back open. How many Vermeers in your beach town’s museum??
Please don’t, for others sake. If you don’t realize how privileged your comment comes off as and how tone deaf it is to post it under a story such as this then you should stay isolated at your “beach place”.
while i agree with you completely, you’re response is 1/2 the problem. everyone from de blas down has this attitude of “we dont need you in nyc”. well unfortunately you do – if middle/upper income ppl keep leaving, there is no tax base & the city will be a complete dump. you have to keep the residential neighborhoods safe & clean if you want ppl to stay. ppl have options
Just here to reiterate that we don’t want you, your spoiled sheltered kids, or your dirty money in our community. Your actions and comments and the exact OPPOSITE of community. So, bye! Enjoy the burbs with the other NIMBYs. I know y’all will stay entertained calling the cops on each other!
Don’t come back if you don’t have to.
I’ve been here throughout and these past two weeks have been so a horrible accelerated deterioration of the Upper West Side.
Crime is up, homeless is up, we have three new male shelters (aka halfway houses) in an 11 block radius AND most importantly – protection and advocacy is down and surveillance is non existent.
Whoever is left here is stuck here. I won’t go as far to say that we’re at a point of no return, but we have our work cut out for us and it will take a while to clean up what’s happened here.
Personally, I’m getting my kids out of here. I tried to withstand it but now it’s selfish to expose them to people tweaking, urinating, barking at them or just plain passed out across the sidewalk.
All the things that you were overpaying for in order to live here, are gone. Stay at the beach, save your money and come back in 10 months and finally get that apartment you’ve dreamed of, at a steal of a price.
Personally I wouldn’t come back now that they’re moving hundreds of drug addicts in to the neighborhood, including some violent sex offenders.
Does anyone know why the access to riverside park from riverside boulevard and 68th was blocked off early this AM? And also why the pier I had barriers?
Are these people auditioning for Donald Trump ads? Their behavior is proving his ridiculous points about chaos in the cities. And what does burning a police car accomplish?
This city is a disaster.
Funny you bring up Donald Trump ads. Remember the one he took out against the Central Park Five?! Remember it when you go to the polls in November.
You missed my point. I despise Trump. He is trying to convince the rest of America that there is anarchy in the cities and he is the guy to fix it. And demonstrations like this in the middle of the night help strengthen his point. Because they accomplish absolutely nothing. You are not building awareness or support for your cause.
His point doesn’t need to be strengthened, it is a reality that liberal cities are falling. Can’t you even see that with your own eyes? Vote smart, vote red.
I’m guessing these protesters don’t have jobs, and they just plan to whine and whine and whine until the next round of handouts come, courtesy of my tax payments.
They do have jobs!
They are getting paid to protest. Why do you think the protesting keeps going?
Do your own research!
BLM has been subsidized by everyone from AirbnbB, Apple, Pfizer, American Express to Cisco to Target. 269 companies you are doing business with have contributed to BLM Look it up! They are VERY WELL funded.
Um. You’re aware there is a global pandemic right now and millions are out of work?
Maybe as you’re being kept up by these miscreants you could do some self-reflection and maybe feel grateful that you get to remain in your cushy home, working your office job from your couch. Not everyone is so fortunate.
Your unacknowledged privilege is showing.
Not a great way to gain fans, wake up people who are already on your side at 2am, but I guess its not really about getting people on your side, is it.
2a? This is acute abuse of privileges of civil disobedience. NYPD needs to grab up these black & white trash genX’s, bag them into white van, lock, cage & call their parents to pick them up in daddy’s Range Rover take them back to their Waldon Pond suburbs & protest deface civilization there in the name of whatever theyr smoking. Basta! In the name of our neighborhoods, Take them off the streets; by any means nec read them their rights, and end such democrat insurrection ‘protests’ which as such should already be unlawfuly prohibted. Be well all.
LOL. GenXers? You know most GenXers are in their fifties now, right grandpa?
Time to update your pejoratives.
“and potentially completely unrelated”. I saw lighting strike the police cruiser, thank you WSR for not coming to conclusions that are racist.
I believe completely in these protests but not at 2am! I was awakened too. Aren’t there any noise ordinances?
Noises ordinances? No. Not for these people. They do what they want. They are spraying graffiti on city and federal buildings without a worry.
I have not been to a BLM protest without amplification–though I haven’t been to one after midnight either.
How dare anyone complain about protestors in front of your windows at 2:00 am using bullhorns and screaming? Sure, they may wake up children, elderly, ill, etc. But only by ruining your quality of life can we eradicate racism. As for the police car, who cares? The leadership of NYC hate the police and want to defund them, so they don’t need cars anyway.
Welcome to NYC 2020, they year where evil won over good.
Please explain how by ruining my quality of life you can eliminate racism? What does this accomplish?
I support the movement and encourage protests but really don’t get this. Especially on the UWS where a higher percentage of people support BLM than in most neighborhoods in America – I know we might seem like a stodgy rich white folks, but trust me, most of us are more liberal than 99% of America. I don’t think John Lewis would endorse this.
This was sarcasm.
Oh my god, won’t someone please think of the parking and me being woken up and having my peaceful night of slumber disturbed???
I mean, it’s just black people being murdered in our streets by a roving band of unaccountable thugs.
You know what’s worse than being woken up? Being woken up by police kicking your door in and murdering you and then walking away with impunity while your family mourns your senseless death.
You should feel lucky all you lost was a little sleep.
A lot of these commenters would have sided with Bull Connor. Disgusting.
Why don’t you go all in and renounce your US citizenship and relocate yourself(and your screen name) to a truly communist / suppressive socialist country, if in fact, that ideology is so attractive to you?
I’d really like to know why you don’t make the move to China, Venezuela, Cuba, Vietnam. They have exactly what you desire, no?
I’d venture to say several members of the forum here would join me in funding your one-way flight. But only if you promised to never return.
Packing yet? Oh, of course not. It’s really easy to be a communist in America, so I guess that’s why you haven’t already done so. Just a hunch.
Yo! We literally can’t leave because your racist president ruined our country so bad nobody will have us
Well said….the entitlement that permeates through these posts is disgusting. “I can’t sleep”, “why come back to NYC from my beach home with all these protestors waking me up in thw middle of the nigbt”? I suppose taking a stand to support black lives is really only appropriate between the hours of 9 to 5. Where are my manners…..
What about the 1 year old black life that was shot in the chest and killed? Does that black life matter?
If it doesn’t fit the woke-Lib narrative, apparently not. And that’s damn shame.
They don’t care about all the casualties of senseless violence – just the ones that get them more power.
Exactly. Thank you for being a fellow voice of reason amongst a ton of selfish insanity. How quickly people forget that while they’re complaining of losing sleep and having one night disturbed, Breonna Taylor lost her life and her loved ones’ entire lives have been disturbed.
I LOVE IT
There’s help available, if only you’re willing to ask for it. Otherwise, don’t hurt yourself getting off that high horse you rode in on.
this is a joke right? I dont know how many people die per year at the hands of police, but the numbers will be MUCH MUCH MUCH higher without police.
Oh gimme a break people… as if being upset by being woken up at 2am automatically means you’re a Bull Connor racist. It is actually possible to support BLM and police reform *and* be annoyed about a 2am wake up call.
I agree. It’s what the late John Lewis called ” Good trouble, necessary trouble” that these protesters were involved in. May justice prevail.
To resident communist:
What is your experience with communism if I may ask?
You are comparing the NY’s Fnest with Nazi Germany.
I would like to know who these people are. They should show their faces instead of hiding behind masks.
But then right minded people will not disturb especially the elderly at 2 a.m.
It takes generations to build a good neighborhood.
It takes only days to destroy it.
You’re right – what a wonderful way to gain support for your cause. Why stop at waking s few people up in the middle of the night? Imagine how successful your movement would be if you expanded this to every night all over the city.
“Resident Communist” — COMMUNISM IS EVIL AND HAS KILLED HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF HUMAN BEINGS.
Got news for you, Chief. So has capitalism.
That’s a lie. I lived under communism, people were literally starving. I would be glad to pay for your one way ticket to Cuba or North Korea or Venezuela, or any other communist place of your choice. It has been tried in dozens of countries, failed every where. Capitalism did not kill hundreds of millions of people, Communism did. Somehow, capitalist countries never restricted emigration while Communist countries did their best to stop their people from leaving the socialist paradise.
I wish someone had the guts to turn a hose on them. Carrying on in the middle of the night is not a peaceful protest. It’s a shame that this city has so demonized police and handcuffed their ability/will to maintain law and order.
I had a cousin who talked like you. Until he got a job, started a family, and bought property. In other words, became a productive member of society.
Why are tgese stories linked? Aside from racism?
This is why we must open the schools. Get the bored and idle kids off the streets and back in the classroom.
The “woke” BLM mob were protesting at 2am because Trader Joe’s had run out of gluten free bread for their avocado toast. Several other news sites have confirmed that part of these 2am protesters broke off from the group to torch the police car on 83rd Street. Also check out on Twitter @chrisgelardi for another video of last night. Bill de Blasio must be so proud. He probably gave them a key to the city.
LITERALLY. Their parents pay their rent in Williamsburg too.
Destroying property, rioting, disturbing a neighborhood in the middle of the night, burning police cars destroys the quality of life in a neighborhood. It does not engender empathy for a cause. It engenders anger at the people doing the burning. More people will leave NYC, and take their tax dollars with them. The city will have less revenue, and will have to raise taxes and cut services for the remaining occupants, and everything will further deteriorate. Wealth disparity will increase and poor people will be further marginalized. The goals of the supposed “movement” will be further away. This is all counterintuitive and juvenile. Running around and destroying things, and playing faux revolutionary is futile and childish.
I live on the second floor of a building on 73rd and West End Avenue and was also awakened by the peaceful protesters. They had a megaphone and were doing performance pieces, nothing provocative. I have a recording and most of what they chanted were from sixties protest lyrics, like “What side are you on.” an old union organizing song written in 1931 and later recorded by Pete Seeger. I took photos of them; someone took one of me in my window and we exchanged greetings. After 10, 15 minutes, they turned and walked peacefully down 73rd, towards Central Park. About a block behind them followed a police cruiser.
At 2 AM not only do Black Lives Matter but so does the life and comfort of the neighborhood. That is the time the police should have Stepped in and peacefully disbanded it
So let’s get this straight: the cops allowed the mob to blast music at 2am???? I wonder how much more crime and mayhem Upper West Siders are willing to tolerate before they wake up and smell the anarchy! The “it’s not really that bad” response is stale. Unless you plan on moving with your head between your tails to the burbs, vote for Republicans! And start with Curtis Sliwa for Mayor.
None of this makes any sense. Why protest in cities that already are liberal?? Why wake up people who are on your side at 2am? This is acting out, this isn’t protest. The point of this is to menace, apparently. If not, why 2am? And why menace the very people who are on your side? It is the mob flexing muscle and telling you to be careful or else, that is how I feel about it.
Wow. Seriously? Why protest in towns that are “already liberal”? Gee, I don’t know, why don’t you ask Eric Garner’s family about that? Or Akai Gurley’s? Or Kalief Browder’s family? Maybe they could enlighten you.
Or maybe the woman who was recently shoved by police so hard for just sitting in the street that she had seizures? Or the countless other peaceful protesters who’ve been beaten and tear gassed for exercising their First Amendment rights?
My goodness, you need to get out more. Or at least read about what’s been going on with the NYPD. This town is hardly liberal. Good grief.
Why don’t we just loot kill and burn till there is nothing left. Smart people, I love it’s just a few bad eggs comments. Even if we arrest the the SO CALLED FEW…bad eggs they are let go, and tie up the police and courts costing the city more money we don’t have. It’s a political and philosophical catch 21.
It reminds me of the Middle East with gangs and no law. Sad
It’s clear that this no longer has anything to do with George Floyd anymore. That’s been the case for a long time.
We are clearly moving into more of an ‘A Clockwork Orange’ type vibe now.
It was never just about George Floyd.It’s about systemic racism and lynchings all around us.
Why did’nt anyone pour hot water out the window if they were so upset
Thanks for letting us know what that was. It was insanely late, and I’m over near CPW and still heard vestiges of it. It’s maddening when we can’t find out the next morning “WTF?” As if we’re not maddened enough.
Since no one was injured in the Police
car this is why our bum mayor considers it peaceful and makes our future as a great metropolis look bleaker every single day.
After what the NYPD pulled snatching that trans teen into an unmarked car only to issue her a DAT, I say I’m all for the protests, especially if they’re bringing them directly to the commissioners doorstep. That’s smart protesting. Everyone complaining about being woken up in the night, imagine being Breonna Taylor and waking up to a no knock warrant and men with guns drawn.
Yes, I was awakened by the chanting this morning — what a beautiful sound — I felt blessed!
Per Yahoo.
“Protesters said they congregated outside of New York Police Department Commissioner Dermot Shea’s apartment in the early hours of July 29 as part of a 24-hour demonstration against the city’s police.
The 24-hour march was organized as a response to the NYPD’s dismantling of an “Occupy City Hall” encampment in Manhattan on July 22, according to event organizers.
Protesters posting on social media said they stopped in front of Shea’s apartment on the Upper West Side to reciprocate the raid…. video shows lights flashing, music blaring, and some people dancing outside apartments along West 73rd Street….”
I am a middle-aged white male who has resided on the UWS for over 30 years. I currently live on WEA and was awakened by the march moving up the avenue and stopping for a brief period in front of my building, before proceeding down W. 73 St. Instead of feeling like a radical mob was about to burn down the neighborhood, I opened the window, leaned out, listened and observed a peaceful (other than chants and a bullhorn) rally that maybe lasted 15 minutes. I closed the window, and went back to sleep. There was nothing to fear from this “mob.” So what if it was uncomfortable for 15 minutes to be awakened in the middle of the night? The fire engines and ambulances that go up and down the avenue in the middle of the night do the same thing: disturb my sleep. If this was an illegal mob and they were making so much noise without a permit, what would stop the NYPD from doing something about it? It was not raucous. It was not dangerous. It was a group of people exercising their First Amendment rights. The comments here reek of entitlement. Until we white folks have walked in the shoes of Black folks, try to have a bit of empathy and think about how many sleepless nights you might have if you lived your life in fear of being pursued by police for the “crime” of being Black. SMH…..
We are seeing daily people throw things at the police, punch them, yell at them, fail to listen to their instructions, etc. And this isn’t really new. Just last summer, police were getting water thrown on them and retreating. Just how “scared” of the police do you think people are?
You could have asked Atatiana Jefferson, Dick Tench, Breonna Taylor, Gay Ellen Plack and many others the same question, had the police not killed them in their own homes
Or, maybe former Police Chief John Whitney will explain it to you.
Geoff, you make a very good point. These tragedies prove a real need to be fearful of the police, especially for Black people. But at the same time, I do not like the way some people are going about handling their frustration. It is not ok to treat a group of people, even police, as a group. But I’m 100% for doing whatever it takes to stop police from having the idea that they can do whatever they want with impunity.
this is the kind of people that put dumblasio in office
Dear Scott,
With respect:I have many Black friends through work who live on the UWS, some in NYCHA building. They would laugh at your misguided, offensive, racist stereotyping.
They do NOT lead their lives, as you say, fearing being “pursued by the police.”
They lead their life fearing other Black people who commit crimes within the community.
I live on 73rd and tweeted you pictures. It was the damn worse. Woke me up at 2:20am
White Brooklynites whose parents pay their rent protesting at 2am in a residential neighborhood — they need to go to park slope and leave us alone. I hate the far left so much.
Looks like I was right not to come back to the city
On the upside, at least this not being blamed on the ‘Tour de France’ cyclists for once…..
With you on that, UWS Cyclist. But I guess there’s always tomorrow knowing this crowd.
Bigger fish to fly, I guess. Ride on brother
The next time you see a Police Officer.Thank him/her.They just might save your ass one day.