ALBANY — Major structural work to tear down the Central Warehouse, the city’s biggest eyesore and a symbol of some of the intractable municipal challenges Albany has long faced, is set to begin Monday night.
Beginning at 9 p.m., workers will start dismantling a spur connected to the Amtrak railroad line that dates to the towering structure’s previous life as a shipping and cold storage facility. Completion of that work will clear the way for a crane to rip out chunks of the building and remove it from a skyline it has dominated for a century.
According to an announcement from Gov. Kathy Hochul and Albany County Executive Daniel P. McCoy, reviewed by the Times Union, contractors will work in 12-hour overnight shifts over the next week to dismantle the rail bridge and associated equipment. The statement says road closures are expected as workers cut the steel tracks and remove the bridge’s girders.
Once that work is complete, the statement says crews will begin installing scaffolding on the south side of the warehouse that will allow workers to start the process of unbuilding the 11-story colossus erected in 1927…