Steven Holzinger
2014-07-18, 11:50 AM
So yesterday I and two of my friends drove up to JFK for the day... my two friends were talking about going up there for a while and we finally decided to go up on Thursday. Had a real good day shooting until we hit up Panera for 31R arrivals.
We were at Panera for about half an hour when a uniformed PORT AUTHORITY cop came over in an unmarked Ford Escape. It was a female officer who asked for our IDs, wondered why two guys from Pennsylvania and one from New Jersey came up to the area to photograph and film airplanes from a mile away from the airport and even had the nerve to ask "why can't you do this at Newark?" and referencing we can't be doing this on a day like today (making an obvious reference to the Malaysian plane that crashed). I politely advised that Newark it can't be done. She warned us that local law enforcement may come by and ask us to leave. We said okay, and she drove off. I felt like her ego was way over what was allowed and she seemed to have an attitude all the way, even with us being as nice and respectful as possible.
Maybe 15-20 minutes later NCPD came by in a marked vehicle. The NCPD officer was very nice and courteous and professional, and we talked with him for 10-15 minutes. In that time frame, the Port cop came by on the opposite side of the NCPD cruiser, yelling through the NCPD officer's vehicle "SEE I TOLD YOU GUYS THE COPS WOULD COME BY!!" Funny... I could see it in the NCPD officer's face that the Port cop had no business being there, and I even overheard her say the phrase "not in my jurisdiction" and he just kept a professional demeanor. We even talked about the Malaysian incident with the NCPD officer and brought him up to speed with all the news updates I'd been seeing come through as news alerts. He took down our names and all and stated we can continue photographing and all that and asked how long we'd be there. Told him an hour or two, and he drove off. No one else bothered us, and my guess of an hour or two was right as they then switched to the 22s. I wish I had gotten the name of the massive ego, power-tripping Port cop because I felt she was way out of line.
Later in the evening we went up to the T5 parking garage. We were there for an hour and a half when an Allied Barton security officer rolled up on us and a Jamaican (I think) asked us that we weren't allowed to photograph and film from there. We asked to speak with his supervisor but he was hesitant to do so - heck we had a hard enough time understanding what he was saying but we decided not to chance it. Heading back to the car it was almost as if he was stalking us the whole way AND almost preventing me from backing out of my parking spot. I almost wanted to tell him if he's throwing us out that we were not going to pay for parking.
Oh and unrelated... why do the parking attendants need to record your plates when you pay for parking? That's the first time I've ever had that happen at ANY airport!
We were at Panera for about half an hour when a uniformed PORT AUTHORITY cop came over in an unmarked Ford Escape. It was a female officer who asked for our IDs, wondered why two guys from Pennsylvania and one from New Jersey came up to the area to photograph and film airplanes from a mile away from the airport and even had the nerve to ask "why can't you do this at Newark?" and referencing we can't be doing this on a day like today (making an obvious reference to the Malaysian plane that crashed). I politely advised that Newark it can't be done. She warned us that local law enforcement may come by and ask us to leave. We said okay, and she drove off. I felt like her ego was way over what was allowed and she seemed to have an attitude all the way, even with us being as nice and respectful as possible.
Maybe 15-20 minutes later NCPD came by in a marked vehicle. The NCPD officer was very nice and courteous and professional, and we talked with him for 10-15 minutes. In that time frame, the Port cop came by on the opposite side of the NCPD cruiser, yelling through the NCPD officer's vehicle "SEE I TOLD YOU GUYS THE COPS WOULD COME BY!!" Funny... I could see it in the NCPD officer's face that the Port cop had no business being there, and I even overheard her say the phrase "not in my jurisdiction" and he just kept a professional demeanor. We even talked about the Malaysian incident with the NCPD officer and brought him up to speed with all the news updates I'd been seeing come through as news alerts. He took down our names and all and stated we can continue photographing and all that and asked how long we'd be there. Told him an hour or two, and he drove off. No one else bothered us, and my guess of an hour or two was right as they then switched to the 22s. I wish I had gotten the name of the massive ego, power-tripping Port cop because I felt she was way out of line.
Later in the evening we went up to the T5 parking garage. We were there for an hour and a half when an Allied Barton security officer rolled up on us and a Jamaican (I think) asked us that we weren't allowed to photograph and film from there. We asked to speak with his supervisor but he was hesitant to do so - heck we had a hard enough time understanding what he was saying but we decided not to chance it. Heading back to the car it was almost as if he was stalking us the whole way AND almost preventing me from backing out of my parking spot. I almost wanted to tell him if he's throwing us out that we were not going to pay for parking.
Oh and unrelated... why do the parking attendants need to record your plates when you pay for parking? That's the first time I've ever had that happen at ANY airport!