Syrup Smell

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Danoff

Danoff

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Mile High City
What's up with the burnt syrup smell you sometimes get in the city? It's hard to describe other than that. I used to smell it when walking around my old university campus at night. The university was located dead center in the city, and I didn't smell it near any restaurants.

Yesterday I was at a mall in downtown burbank and I smelled it again.

Anyone have any ideas? Smells just like syrup... old nasty burnt syrup.
 
University? Probably marijuana. Burbank? Burnt sewage.

There are a lot of plants that have seasonal smells to them (many of which aren't pleasant). At my university, there were these plants everywhere that smelled like a combination of bleach and sweaty feet in the late spring/early summer.

Your guess is as good as mine...
 
Kylehnat
At my university, there were these plants everywhere that smelled like a combination of bleach and sweaty feet in the late spring/early summer.

Your guess is as good as mine...
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That reminds me of that tree they had at my high school that smelled like fish.
 
Kylehnat
University? Probably marijuana. Burbank? Burnt sewage.

There are a lot of plants that have seasonal smells to them (many of which aren't pleasant). At my university, there were these plants everywhere that smelled like a combination of bleach and sweaty feet in the late spring/early summer.

Your guess is as good as mine...
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It's definitely not plant life, and it isn't marijuana. It could be sewage, but why would it smell like syrup and not more like trash or feces?
 
That's a noodle-scratcher. I know many odd city-smells, but I've never experienced the burnt syrup. Maybe a sugar truck exploded :).
 
Are there any donut stands around? Or those carts that cook up hot, sugar-coated peanuts... but if you ever buy some, they always give you a bag which is just one big lump of cold, stuck-together nuts :grumpy: Or could it be candy floss?? (not very common on the streets of a city, sadly)

Holborn underground station (in London) always smells of caramelised onions, because of the hotdog vendors who stand at the entrance so that the smell wafts down the escalators and up the nostrils of drunk people with no fear of food poisoning.

During winter, along Tottenham Court/Charing Cross Road and Oxford Street, the re is always a smell like burning logs - usually due to the roast chestnut stalls parked all over the shop...

All I can say is, thank goodness these smells are so prevalent, because otherwise you'd smell what central London actually smells of :sick:
 
I know what you are talking about. I smell it a lot of times too, especially when crossing over those grates in the sidewalks that look into storm sewers and access tunnels. If I had to guess I would say it isn't sweage, because no city woudl have those open grates for the sewer.

Since many are storm sewers and access tunnels I woudl say that teh smell is possibly trash/litter in general kind of rotting, getting that almost sickly sweet smell. Then combine that with the steam those things are usually helping to vent and you get a burnt syrup smell. Many buildings have these hidden behind the building too for access and venting to their furnace systems so you could catch the smell without ever seeing these. I noticed in college the smell was generally near the steam plant used for the heating of all the buildings.

Just a guess though.
 
FoolKiller
I know what you are talking about. I smell it a lot of times too, especially when crossing over those grates in the sidewalks that look into storm sewers and access tunnels. If I had to guess I would say it isn't sweage, because no city woudl have those open grates for the sewer.

Since many are storm sewers and access tunnels I woudl say that teh smell is possibly trash/litter in general kind of rotting, getting that almost sickly sweet smell. Then combine that with the steam those things are usually helping to vent and you get a burnt syrup smell. Many buildings have these hidden behind the building too for access and venting to their furnace systems so you could catch the smell without ever seeing these. I noticed in college the smell was generally near the steam plant used for the heating of all the buildings.

Just a guess though.
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Yup, I was definitely near the steam plant in college - so that lines up with your thinking.

I'm still not seeing how trash rotting turns into a sickly sweet smell, but it would appear to have something to do with steam vents.

Duke
Count yer friggin' blessings.
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Good point. But still, why syrup? It's bizarre. Maybe they add something to cover the smell purposefully.
 
Danoff
I'm still not seeing how trash rotting turns into a sickly sweet smell, but it would appear to have something to do with steam vents.
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Sickly sweet would be how I refer to the smell you get from a dumpster. Unless there is meat involved it has this horrid stench that has this background sweet smell to it, almost like an over-ripe fruit.

Maybe my days working in an amusement park and theater in high school and college have skewed my impression of rotting trash in dumpsters, but after all the breads, sweets, and beverages everything had this nasty rotting smell, but it was laced with an obviously sweet tinge. To me the stench in a drainage or wash off area is very similar as most litters don't involve hunks of meat, but the kind of stuff you find in an amusement park. It is usually things like cold fries, wrappers, cups, bottles, and poured out beverages. Get that mix to rotting and heat it with some steam and I imagine the smell you are referring to.

Really now that I think of it I wonder if it isn't just a case of poured out beverages in general. I know I have poured my fair share of flat or unbearably hot soft drinks on the ground before throwing the cup away in an indoors trash can. I see people open their door and pour stuff out of mugs and cups all the time, sometimes while sitting at a light in traffic. Then even if someone doesn't pour it out and just throws their cup, with beverage, away it does not sit in that trash can building a pool in the bottom, at least not public trashcans. They have cheap leaky bags and drains for rain water. Beverages just dribble out onto the ground. And then when someone actually empties the trash you can follow them nearly an hour later by following the sticky goo trail. You've probably even seen it days later in an amusement park where there is that slightly darker dribble pattern on the walkway where dirt stuck to where they carried/drug the bag.
 
Sureshot
Wouldn't it be cool if a city smelt of burning rubber, or burning nitro? :sly:
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Actually, I often think I smell nitromethane. I've been to many drag races and I sure know what the stuff smells like (and hurts like) but it's weird when you're walking through the hallway at school and you smell it.

At my work there's been more than a few times at the dumpster outside when I have to stop and take another whiff of the stuff inside. Every now and then it's actually a pleasant, sweet smell.

Sometimes when I leave food in my trash can too long my room gets a stinky-sweet smell. Must be the food and stuff in the trash dumpsters and vents, Danoff.
 

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