By Dustin Brown
The customers crowded inside the New Thompson’s Diner on Queens Boulevard offer an unedited glimpse of the surrounding Long Island City neighborhood.
Filing into the aluminum-paneled restaurant are young women wearing tight jeans and black sleeveless tops, construction workers sporting mesh orange vests and teenage boys in baggy pants who sit in the corner, lobbing insults back and forth.
Some are students from LaGuardia Community College and Aviation High School, others work at the factories that line the streets on either side of Queens Boulevard.
But now there’s a new type stepping up to the faux-marble countertop, such as the gent in a dark suit who ordered coffee early one afternoon before pulling out the red security badge he needed to get inside his building — the Museum of Modern Art, the diner’s neighbor down the street.
The New Thompson’s Diner sits on the south side of Queens Boulevard between the elevated trestles of the No. 7 train and the blue box on 33rd Street that is MoMA QNS. Once a factory used by the Swingline staple company, the building painted in a striking coat of blue will serve for the next three years as the primary exhibition space for the Museum of Modern Art while its Manhattan home is renovated and expanded.
Although MoMA QNS does not open its doors to the public until June 29, the Queens Boulevard businesses that run along its side between 32nd Place and 33rd Street already are preparing for what may be a deluge of new patrons, although no one is placing any bets just yet.
“We hope to get more customers,” said Marcos Pesantez, 28, an East Elmhurst resident who bought New Thompson’s in September.
To cater to the museum crowd, Pesantez is taking down his old menu, which hangs at eye level behind the counter with large pictures of standard fare, such as the “Cheeseburger Deluxe,” and adding some new tastes that may be more appealing for the art lovers.
“Right now we have like the heavy meals here,” he said, noting that the only vegetarian dish is a veggie burger. “If we get a crowd from the museum, we’re gonna make it more light — a lot of vegetables, pasta, vegetarian sandwiches.”
Next door Johnny Cullinane is the manager of a nondescript corner grocery and parking lot that also abuts the museum so closely that a line of front bumpers practically press against MoMA’s blue wall.
Cullinane is an old hand at museums, having run a business for seven years that specialized in moving and installing pieces of art.
Although excited to see the museum land next door, he also has his doubts about the “modern” stuff, recalling a piece he once saw in which a vacuum cleaner was placed in a Plexiglas box.
“Same vacuum cleaner I have at home,” he said, casting some doubt on the validity of the art.
The grocery may expand into a smaller section of the building that currently is not used, but the parking lot is unlikely to reap much benefit from the museum-goers. On weekdays the lot already is filled with black cars left by drivers visiting the nearby offices of the Taxi and Limousine Commission, while street parking is generally plentiful on the weekends, although some still may opt for the security of a private lot.
“You might get somebody with the expensive car, the Mercedes and the Beemer,” Cullinane said.
His building also is getting something of a face-lift in the form of a new paint job, meant to match the improvements done by the museum.
“They cleaned theirs up so now we’ve got to repaint,” said Jimmy Sileo, who parks cars for the lot. “Within the next two weeks, this will all be done.”
Back at the diner, business already has seen some effect from the museum. Construction workers patronized the shop while they were renovating the old factory, and now museum employees stop in to get coffee or sandwiches, recognizable by their signature red security tags.
“Right now I have my old customers, but it’s increasing my business a little bit,” Pesantez said.
Although the museum may help mold a more promising future for his business, Pesantez also has some other new beginnings on his mind.
Days before MoMA QNS opens, his wife is due to have their first baby.
Reach reporter Dustin Brown by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 154.
