And then you realize that you know very little about the maritime industry. It’s like that abandoned car in the vacant lot down the street except no one seems to notice — until now:

On Monday, two City Council members and a state assemblyman announced their disgust with what they called a growing problem: abandoned construction barges and other vessels left to rust, buckle, leak and eventually sink to the bottom of remote corners of rivers and tributaries feeding Jamaica Bay.

In January, the National Parks Service estimated that about 190 abandoned vessels — many of them small boats, apparently privately owned — had been left to rot in the 25,000 acres that make up Jamaica Bay. Since then, about 40 vessels have been removed, said Brian Feeney, a Parks Service spokesman.

In a news conference held by the East River in Manhattan on Monday, City Councilmen David Yassky and Eric Gioia said that abandoned industrial barges had become a threat to the health of city estuaries.

“For too long, it’s been the Wild West in New York Harbor,” Mr. Yassky said.

Since 2006, the officials said, one company in particular has repeatedly tugged barges into Newtown Creek, in Brooklyn, and other New York rivers and bays, to let them rot. Mr. Yassky said the company, Pile Foundation Construction Co., of Hicksville, N.Y., was pursuing what he called an intentional “abandon-and-sink strategy” within the city, and must be stopped.

Earlier: How Dare You Barge Right In Here!