By Gus Saltonstall
The boxes are hard to miss.
A trio of large, orange U-Haul boxes that are sitting in the parking lane on the east side of West End Avenue between 90th and 91st streets.
They are over six feet tall and all display the same message.
“U-Haul At Your Door – U-Box Move & Store – We Ship Anywhere – uhaul.com 1-877-GO-U-HAUL”
Susan Jones, who lives in the area, told West Side Rag that the boxes appeared around two weeks ago.
“They are quite large and unseemly,” Jones wrote in an email. “No one seems to know who put them there. Someone in my building said she has seen rats running into and out of them.”
The Rag reached out to U-Haul to see if the moving company had placed the boxes on the Upper West Side in an official capacity, but we have not heard back as of Monday afternoon.
On a visit to the Upper West Side block on Monday, WSR peeked behind the orange signage on the boxes, and nothing appeared to be inside, besides the wooden frame to support the outer message.
An employee of one of the buildings on the West End Avenue block who was sweeping the sidewalk on Monday morning, but chose not to share his name, said he also had no idea where the boxes had come from.
The boxes are sitting in what would either be two tight parking spaces, or one spacious spot. Nearby signage indicates that it is a legal parking area, outside of 9:30 to 11:00 a.m. on Tuesdays and Fridays.
While there is nothing to indicate as such, one theory on the appearance of the three boxes is that someone is using the structures to save themselves a parking spot. There have been multiple examples of New Yorkers using trash cans, bikes, cones, or some other object in an attempt to save themselves a parking space for their cars.
West Side Rag will continue to investigate the appearance of the three boxes, and update this story when more information is learned.
UPDATE: Tuesday on July 22 at 8:30 a.m: A U-Haul spokesperson confirmed to West Side Rag on Monday night that the crates are the company’s U-Box products, which are used to help people store and move items. The boxes are generally used for a couple days, though, during a move, and it is still unclear why they have been in a legal parking space for close to two weeks.
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One loves a good mystery, Keep us posted.
Especially when it’s determined why they’ve been there nearly two weeks. That’s the update I’d like to read.
I hope it has something to do with pizza
I have heard that private contractors of the DOD will be using them for storing nuclear warheads. Tactical only though.
Perhaps the elusive Epstein client list is inside?
Is that where Pam Bondi dumps the output of her paper-shredder?
Whew, that’s a relief! I’m glad it was nothing nefarious.
If I was looking for parking, I might just move one.
Great idea, I am often short on storage space and don’t own a car, so I should just put a couple of these out in the street in front of my building.
exactly. if everyone else can store pricate property in public space for free, why not this?
This is a common service provided by U-Haul to someone who wants to move. They deliver the palletized containers, you fill them, and then they lift them on to a flat bed truck and take them to your destination … https://www.uhaul.com/UBox/ … someone is either about to move or has just moved in.
They cannot be on the street in NYC.
Clearly they can!
I love how you folks are so confidently, assertively wrong about things you clearly know nothing about.
The company gets a permit from the city, so yes, they absolutely can be on the street.
The online NYC Streets Permit Management System shows no permits for that block.
No, they don’t. Anyone who has familiarity with UHAUL knows it’s a bare bones operation.
https://www.uhaul.com/FrequentlyAskedQuestions/U-Box/
Permit requirements vary depending on your local city regulations or HOA rules. We recommend checking with your city or homeowners association to find out if a permit is needed for your U-Box containers.
In other words, the permits are the user’s problem. Once UHAUL drops the pods off it’s not their problem anymore. Highly doubtful that the vast majority of users actually get permits.
If the company can do this after getting a permit, then the permit is supposed to be posted, and a company like U Haul knows this.
You can rent one of these on AirBnB for $300/night…probably:)
Someone is moving out or in and Uhaul offers their own version of PODS. You need a forklift, or at least a pallet lifter, to move one even if its empty.
ICE comfort stations?
The boxes can only be there, when it is legal for a. car to park there.
one can report through 311
https://portal.311.nyc.gov/article/?kanumber=KA-01980
U-Haul U-Box containers can be placed on the street for moving purposes, but it’s crucial to ensure they are parked legally and safely, following local parking regulations. They can be placed in legal parking spaces, but should not violate any posted rush-hour or street sweeping restrictions.
Someone needs to call the police and have them removed.
Why do you want to have the police removed? And what does that have to do with the mysterious boxes?
you must have never dealt with the police
They are right there in the street and have been for weeks. You’d think the police and the street swerper would have seen them. But the leap from seeing them to doing somethibg is just too big.
There is no mystery here. These are similar to PODS. The are LEGAL to be dropped off and the user fills them at their own pace. and then calls Uhaul to pick them up and ship or store them.
Useally they are placed on the sidewalk not the street
How ridiculous. This is not suburbia. They cannot be on the street and will soon be filled with trash, rats, and junk. They are completely illegally placed street furniture. Sanitation and DOT have every right to remove them and so does the police, any BID, or anyone who can drag them to a dumpster.
nonsense. its no different than a car.
Then it should have been ticketed and towed by now.
A car can’t be in the same spot 24/7 for weeks at a time.
You could say the exact same thing about using the curb for free private car storage
It would be truly just if the boxes were ticketed and towed to the pound.
And…please…WHY have the police not towed them away like cars illegally parked for 2 weeks???
No wheels?
They can’t be that heavy. Considering that this is the UWS, where’s the committee? Where’s the missing iguana poster? Better yet, why haven’t they been removed by an axe wielding mob of concerned citizens? And while we’re at it, let’s get the David Koch name off the fountain in front of the MET museum.
I’m all for anonymous generosity, but Mr. Koch did give $65 million as the sole gift to the renovation of the Met plaza. His name on the fountains is small appreciation. (Not to mention $150 million to Memorial Sloan Kettering, $100 million to NY Cornell-Weill Hospital, $100 million for the renovation of the State Theater at Lincoln Center,,,,you can see where I’m going with this.)
You and I can make our gifts without fanfare should we choose.
Why in the world do they attract rats? ? I am phobic. I would never walk on that block!
To shade themselves from the sun, perhaps stay cooler?
So I failed to solve the mystery of Gladys the Goose, then?
Oh, put me out of my misery and tell me the name of the store which sold me Gladys! Or maybe you don’t really know ?
So THERE you are! I think we’ve been doing a little ships-in-the-night number here.
True, maybe I don’t really know, but my answer remains where I originally left it: https://www.westsiderag.com/2025/07/10/throwback-thursday-memories-of-the-upper-west-side-in-the-1970s-and-80s#comment-579926 (just below your comment, actually).
I keep on referring back to there because I also included a puzzler for you.
This is precisely the kind of quality of life concern that NYPD’s new policy initiative is designed to solve. Contact the newly expanded 311 service to make tha complaint and that should be followed by removal of the containers.
Neil, President of 24 Precinct Community Council
Please keep that 20th precinct attitude out of the confines of the 24th precinct.
Calling 311 to remove the containers is a joke like talking to a wall & expecting an answer.
311 online immediately gets cars parked in front of hydrants ticketed immediately, often within 15 minutes. Other quality of life complaints are suspiciously “closed” within 5 minutes of submitting.
The police respond; other department not so much.
not my experience at all.
I think your glass is only half full!
will this work on the ice cream trucks that are allowed to park anywhere they want all day long?
Quality of life complaints are so 1999. Can’t wait for Mamdani to take over.
I think she means unsightly. If they were lewd, they’d be unseemly.
If they were lewd, they’d be popular.
For goodness sake, call 311 and they will take care of them. How ridiculous! Be proactive.
Proactive sounds great, but not always productive in NYC. It’s nice of the city to let us believe that we have a voice.
Bloomberg started 311 to keep citizens from contacting city officials and employees directly.
I would have called the city to have them removed.
I live on this block and sent 311 a complaint last week about these boxes. I had no idea what category to even put them in! They could just be a new mode of advertising, or moving pods, or homeless abodes or even nefarious storage containers housing who knows what! Get rid of them! They are eyesores, and we need the parking spots!
A. To those saying the boxes can sit there because cars can… even if there is a spot with no alternate side parking regulations, it’s illegal for cars to park in the same spot for more than 7 days.
B. To those who demand police action… they cannot ticket a box because it has no license plate. You need a license plate or some form or registration so a ticket can be associated with a person in some way. NYPD precincts don’t have fork lifts and flat bed trucks. And without a license plate, there’s no way an owner/renter would know where the box was “towed” to. Because the automated system to track towed vehicles are based on license plate numbers. The solution may be notifying the NYC Sheriff’s department (different from NYPD) because they handle a lot of business enforcement.
Parking enforcement is not doing their job. There is no accountability. Who even heads up that department? Thanks to the black box of 311 obfuscation, nobody knows.
Gus, I have your next scoop, may I suggest the title: Thousands of ‘Unseemly’ and Puzzling Metal Boxes Appear on Upper West Side Streets
It can be all about how a small minority of car owners store their personal metal boxes on the street for free for weeks on end, moving them only for street sweeping. I’m happy to be interviewed and provide quotes.
“Nearby signage indicates that it is a legal parking area, outside of 9:30 to 11:00 a.m. from Tuesday through Friday.”. I think what you mean to write is “9:30 to 11:00 am on Tuesday and Friday mornings”.