Central Park, April 10, 2017
photo by Roger W. Smith
The sun does arise,
And make happy the skies.
The merry bells ring
To welcome the Spring.
The sky-lark and thrush,
The birds of the bush,
Sing louder around,
To the bells’ cheerful sound.
While our sports shall be seen
On the Ecchoing Green.
— William Blake, “The Ecchoing Green”
(to a friend)
Like most people, I am a “transplanted” New Yorker. I have lived here for a long time and love the City.
The following are some of the things I love about my adopted city.
WALKING
Walk Fifth Avenue, from, say the 40’s, up to the Metropolitan Museum, which is at around 81st Street. The stretch of Fifth Avenue from 59th Street to around 96th Street is beautiful. It is residential and borders Central Park.
Walk downtown via Park Avenue South; get onto Broadway at around 14th Street and keep going downtown, thru the East Village and Soho. Go all the way down to City Hall. Right next to City Hall is the Brooklyn Bridge. Walk over it; it’s cool. There is a boardwalk and there will be lots of happy people. Great view.
Visit SoHo (a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan).
Walk up Broadway on the West Side, past Lincoln Center, to Broadway in the 70’s and 80’s.
Go to Central Park! A must.
Stay away from Times Square — sucks.
CULTURAL INSTITUTIONS
The Morgan Library (a museum at 36th Street and Madison Avenue). They currently have an Emily Dickinson exhibit. They feature art and old manuscripts. A very nice place.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Hang out there. You can relax in the cafeteria in the basement.
A visit to the New York Public Library is a must; it is located at Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Street. Beautiful building. Great cultural institution.
I would say avoid the Modern Museum of Art — nothing great; overpriced.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is open on Friday and Saturday evenings until 9 p.m. It’s best time to visit, is not crowded at those times. Most people do not know that you do not have to pay the “suggested” admission price of $25. The official museum policy is that visitors can pay whatever they wish as an entrance fee. A dollar, twenty-five cents. No problem.
SHOPPING
If you like to shop, Lord and Taylor’s at 38th and Fifth Avenue is a very nice store. Nice snack bar on the sixth floor. Clothing is pricey, but not that expensive. Most of the other clothing stores in the City are rip-offs. I would advise staying away from Herald Square and Macy’s. Herald Square is not in a nice neighborhood.
I don’t like Bloomingdale’s.
FOOD
Try the Oyster Bar if you like seafood. It is located on the lower level of Grand Central Station at 42nd and Lexington Avenue. Walk around Grand Central; awesome building.
Also, El Quijote (continental Spanish cuisine) on 23rd Street between Seventh and Eighth avenues. Order the paella.
TRANSPORTATION
Subways are the best way to get around. Or walking.
The subways can be confusing (an understatement) because there are so many lines and such a variety of connections. But, ask someone for help. You would be surprised how willing New Yorkers are to help strangers find their way. I discovered this myself many years ago.
CINEMA
Film Forum (West Village) — the best.
Angelika on Houston Street.
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas (Broadway at 62nd Street).
BOOKS
If you want to get great cheap used books, visit the Strand Bookstore at Broadway and 12th Street. There’s no other bookstore like it.
ALSO
Some people like the High Line. It’s okay; it’s is fun to walk it once. It runs from 14th Street West to the West 30’s. Good view of Manhattan from an elevated perspective.
Some parts of Brooklyn have become trendy – e.g., Williamsburg. Greenpoint is fairly close to Manhattan; it provides an interesting change of pace.
— Roger W. Smith
April 2017
********************************************************
Addendum:
Bill Dalzell of Salem, MA, a longtime friend of mine who read this post, reminded me of one of his and also my favorite things to do in New York City in the past: take the Staten Island Ferry to Staten Island and back.
My friend Bill used to live in Manhattan, but no longer does. He was one of the first people I got to know after moving here, and he would often suggest New York things to do, such as taking the ferry.
Indeed, it was a wonderful trip. It cost only a nickel each way then (in the late 1960’s).
You would have a great view of New York Harbor and the Statue of Liberty. You could stand outside on the deck and get not only a close up view, but also experience a refreshing breeze, welcome in New York City summers.
I told my friend Bill that I haven’t taken the ferry in a while. I’ll have to do it again. But, from the last few times I took it (and I used to do it quite often), which was at least ten years ago, the boasts had changed — it was a disappointment. The new style boats (which did not LOOK so new) had little or no deck space and it was no longer an option to stand outside. Well, you could, sort of, but the only available deck space, so to speak, was a very small area at the prow. It did not provide a good vantage point and it was a very tight space that could accommodate only five or six people. The design of the boats having changed, the ferry is less fun to take nowadays. Or, so it seems to me.
A footnote: In 1953, when I was age seven, my parents took me on a three day trip to Manhattan, which was a thrill. It was oppressively hot summer weather. Among other things we did was take the Staten Island Ferry to cool off.
********************************************************
Addendum:
Sadly, the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s admissions fee, discussed above, may be changing. The museum, which has tried in the past to deceive visitors about the fee, is said to be contemplating a change its policy which would mean that out of town visitors would be required to pay a fee. See
“Visit to the Met Could Cost You, if You Don’t Live in New York,” The New York Times, April 26, 2017
Pfaff’s beer cellar, a bohemian watering hole and a center of literary life in Manhattan in the mid-nineteenth century, was located at 647 Broadway in what is now called Lower Manhattan. (At the time, most of Manhattan was below 14th Street.)
The building in which Pfaff’s was located still stands. It is now occupied by a deli (see photograph below) and is on Broadway between Bleecker and Bond Streets. Access to the cramped cellar where Pfaff’s was located is still possible.
— Roger W. Smith
February 2017; updated June 2019
*************************************************
–The vault at Pfaffs where the drinkers and laughers meet to eat and drink and carouse
While on the walk immediately overhead pass the myriad feet of Broadway
As the dead in their graves are underfoot hidden
And the living pass over them, recking not of them,
Laugh on laughers!
Drink on drinkers!
Bandy the jest!
Toss the theme from one to another!
Beam up–Brighten up, bright eyes of beautiful young men!
Eat what you, having ordered, are pleased to see placed before you–after the work of the day, now, with appetite eat,
Drink wine–drink beer–raise your voice,
Behold! your friend, as he arrives–Welcome him, where, from the upper step, he looks down upon you with a cheerful look
Overhead rolls Broadway–the myriad rushing Broadway
The lamps are lit–the shops blaze–the fabrics vividly are seen through the plate glass windows
The strong lights from above pour down upon them and are shed outside,
The thick crowds, well-dressed–the continual crowds as if they would never end
The curious appearance of the faces–the glimpse just caught of the eyes and expressions, as they flit along,
(You phantoms! oft I pause, yearning, to arrest some one of you!
Oft I doubt your reality–whether you are real–I suspect all is but a pageant.)
The lights beam in the first vault–but the other is entirely dark
In the first
— “The Two Vaults,” unpublished poem by Walt Whitman
*************************************************
A GLIMPSE through an interstice caught,
Of a crowd of workmen and drivers in a bar-room around the
stove late of a winter night, and I unremark’d seated in a
corner,
Of a youth who loves me and whom I love, silently approaching
and seating himself near, that he may hold me by the hand,
A long while amid the noises of coming and going, of drinking
and oath and smutty jest,
There we two, content, happy in being together, speaking little,
perhaps not a word.
— Walt Whitman, “A Glimpse”
*****************************************************
I am glad to see you are engaged in such good work at Washington. It must be even more refreshing than to sit by Pfaff’s privy and eat sweet-breads and drink coffee, and listen to the intolerable wit of the crack-brains. I happened in there the other night, and the place smelt as atrociously as ever. Pfaff looked as of yore
— John Swinton to Walt Whitman, February 25, 1863
*****************************************************
“After the publication of “Leaves of Grass” Mr. Whitman became acquainted with most all of the younger generation of literary men across the river in New York, and especially with those who eventually enrolled themselves under the good fellowship of old Henry Clapp, who had been living a free and easy life in Paris and longed to establish a Bohemia in New York like Henry Murger’s “Vie de Boheme” in Paris. The headquarters — still well remembered — was at Pfaff’s restaurant in Broadway, near Bond st.
“I used to go to Pfaff’s nearly every night,” Mr. Whitman went on. “It used to be a pleasant place to go in the evening after taking a bath and finishing the work of the day. When it began to grow dark Pfaff would politely invite everybody who happened to be sitting in the cave he had under the sidewalk to some other part of the restaurant. There was a long table extending the length of this cave; and as soon as the Bohemians put in an appearance Henry Clapp would take a seat at the head of this table. I think there was as good talk around that table as took place anywhere in the world. Clapp was a very witty man. Fitz James O’Brien was very bright. Ned Wilkins, who used to be the dramatic critic of the Herald, was another bright man. There were between twenty-five and thirty journalists, authors, artists and actors who made up the company that took possession of the cave under the sidewalk. Pfaff himself I took a dislike to the first time I ever saw him. But my subsequent acquaintance with him taught me not to be too hasty in making up my mind about people on first sight. He turned out to be a very agreeable, kindly man in many ways. He was always kind to beggars and gave them food freely. Then he was easily moved to sympathise with any one who was in trouble and was generous with his money. I believe he was at that time the best judge of wine of anybody in this country.”
— interview with Walt Whitman by F.B.S., Brooklyn Eagle, July 11, 1886
*****************************************************
The former Pfaff’s was located in this deli on Broadway near Bleecker Street. Photo by Roger W. Smith.
Han’s Deli Grocery, 645 Broadway, New York, NY, through within which one can can gain access to the former beer cellar (photograph by Roger W. Smith).
Below: Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan on a weekday afternoon in February 2017. This is “traffic bedlam”? (See commentary below.)
Below: Fifth Avenue near 50th Street at 2:15 p.m. on Thursday, April 27, 2017. Same comment as above. (Traffic engineer needed?)
Below: Fifth Avenue at 34th Street, 1:59 p.m., Monday, May 8, 2017. Traffic flowing just fine on a weekday and is in fact light.
Below: two photos of pedestrians on Fifth Avenue in Midtown near 42nd Street and in the 60’s just north of 59th Street. “One of the world’s densest concentrations of humanity”?
*****************************************************
Re
“A Plea for Fifth Avenue” by Janette Sadik-Khan (former commissioner of the New York City Department of Transportation), op-ed, The New York Times , January 9, 2017
******************************************************
This op ed should be retitled: “A PLAN to DESTROY Fifth Avenue.”
It is a horrible piece, founded on plain bad thinking. It doesn’t take a traffic engineer, city planner, or urban studies professor to see this.
If Jane Jacobs could read this piece, she would be rolling over in her grave.
Below are the points made by Ms. Sadik-Khan (in boldface), followed seriatim by my commentary.
— Roger W. Smith
January 2017; updated April 2017
************************************************
To quote from Ms. Sadik-Khan’s New York Times op ed piece. (Her words are in boldface, followed by my comments.)
“President-elect Donald J. Trump, lives in New York City, on Fifth Avenue.”
So what? Fifth Avenue has been a Manhattan thoroughfare over 150 years; Donald Trump’s presidency will last at most for eight years. Fifth Avenue is approximately 135 city blocks — or just under seven miles — long from south to north. Donald Trump’s residence, Trump Tower, is situated on a single block between 56th and 57th Streets.
Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan is “home to one of the world’s densest concentrations of humanity and traffic bedlam.”*
Except for the fact that a few sections such as streets in the vicinity of Trump Tower have been closed to traffic, causing traffic problems (and a block long stretch of the avenue having been closed to pedestrians on the block where Trump Tower is located),* traffic on the avenue usually flows smoothly, as I have observed for years — there is hardly ever “traffic bedlam.” Yes, there is often a dense concentration of humanity on some parts of the avenue, such as near Rockefeller Center and Grand Army Plaza, but wide sidewalks make the avenue very walkable, and there is nothing like the congestion, pedestrian wise, that one often experiences in Times Square.
Fifth Avenue is not “home to one of the world’s densest concentrations of humanity.” Factually inaccurate. Maybe Calcutta.
* This was a problem in January 2017 when this post was written. With Trump having moved to Washington, pedestrian and vehicular traffic on Fifth Avenue near Trump Tower now flows well. Some side streets are still closed off.
“Fifth Avenue’s five lanes run past landmarks like the New York Public Library, the Empire State Building and Rockefeller Center, as well as numerous cathedrals of commerce, tourism and high-end retail. Because the avenue is such a popular destination, retail floor space there rents for $3,000 per square foot a year, the highest price in the world, more than double the cost of similar space along the Champs Élysées. It seems appropriate that gold is a popular color for building facades on Fifth.”
So what? Landmarks make the avenue special. Expensive retail shops give it a feeling of luxuriousness. Yes, Fifth Avenue is a premium locale, Manhattan’s priciest and most exclusive avenue, with expensive properties. Is that a bad thing? People of modest means or less than high class status are by no means barred from it.
“Fifth Avenue at 56th Street is the site of Mr. Trump’s apartment in Trump Tower, which has rapidly turned into a fortress of Secret Service agents and heavily armed police officers surrounded by curious tourists, camera crews and protesters. They join the usual shoppers, workers and other pedestrians on what were already crowded sidewalks, and often spill into the street. This has significantly slowed traffic, and security concerns have forced the closing of side streets.”
This is too bad. But is the solution for this inconvenience to restrict access to the avenue even more? When and to what end, I ask. What will this accomplish? The solution proposed is right out of Part III of Gulliver’s Travels (“A Voyage to Laputa”; the opening chapters of same).
“While Mr. Trump has said he will move into the White House, his wife and youngest child plan to wait until at least the end of the school year. During the campaign, Mr. Trump was known for flying home late at night so that he could wake up in his own bed, and he has said that he plans to return to the city frequently. If he chooses to stay even part of the week in New York, Trump Tower will become a de facto presidential residence and seat of global power.”
More power to him (and Madame Trump). For this, the traffic czars want to restrict traffic access to Fifth Ave?
“The motorcades and security restrictions that will result will permanently paralyze the city’s streets. The swearing-in hasn’t even happened, but the swearing has already started: New Yorkers want their Fifth Avenue back.”
Ditto. I don’t like the disruption of traffic and pedestrian flow caused by Trump Tower’s being the home of the newly elected president. Let’s hope they don’t “permanently paralyze the city’s streets.” Is she thinking of shutting the City down?
“As much as Mr. Trump’s election is a historic moment, it also provides an extraordinary opportunity to reclaim Fifth Avenue as a pedestrian street, free of private vehicular traffic but shared with mass transit. The change, which should span the stretch of the avenue from Central Park to the Empire State Building at 34th Street, would create a truly American public space: an entirely new civic platform at the nation’s new center of political gravity.”
Aha, here’s what she wants! To get rid of traffic on Fifth Avenue and recreate on one of the world’s great avenues a so called “public space”! Her zany proposal, if implemented, will ruin the avenue and destroy its character, for sure. Look what the traffic engineers have already done to Times Square and other parts of the city, such as Herald Square. (See photo below of miserable people in the horrible, ugly “public space” that now graces — meant sarcastically — the epicenter of Times Square.)
Who says (why in God’s name does she?) that Fifth Avenue has to be “reclaimed?” As if we were in the South Bronx of the 1970’s.
“[R]eclaim Fifth Avenue as a pedestrian street.” What? It’s already a great pedestrian street. (See photos below.) It’s not in need of “reclamation”!
“A natural comparison would be with car-free Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House. Creating public plazas out of streets physically embodies democracy in cities. It gives people room to reflect on their civic institutions instead of being herded along — as they currently are around Trump Tower.”
“Creating public plazas out of streets physically embodies democracy in cities.”
Highfalutin psychobabble. NONSENSE masquerading as wisdom.
“It gives people room to reflect on their civic institutions instead of being herded along — as they currently are around Trump Tower.”
“Herded along”? I can walk just fine on Fifth Avenue, thank you very much, without any one redesigning it for me. It’s a great street to walk on. So much fun. Wide sidewalks. No impediments, save for the barriers and police presence between 56th And 57th Streets, which I myself don’t like, and which are quite recent. Because of this, this nutty “savant “wants to shut down fifteen more blocks of the avenue (to traffic).
“Room to reflect on their civic institutions”? That’s a good one. Is this what the people in the photo below of Times Square’s truly horrible public space are doing?
Think about it. Traffic runs one way on Fifth Avenue (downtown, from north to south). This was the result of making Manhattan’s avenues one way in the 1950’s to improve traffic flow. There are ample sidewalks on either side of the avenue, which give pedestrians the opportunity to not only stroll the avenue and people watch, but also to look at and perhaps visit the shops and institutions which they pass. For example, I like to walk past the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets and admire its beauty and grandeur (people are always congregated on the library steps and in front of the building, enjoying the sun in the summer time, taking photos, enjoying a coffee), past department stores such as Lord and Taylor’s at 38th and Fifth Avenue, and so on.
Fifth Avenue is a great street to walk on, plain and simple. But what does Janette Sadik-Khan, who is anti-automobile, propose doing? Shutting down three lanes of the avenue, which would be exclusively for pedestrians. Why? Who wants to walk in the MIDDLE of the street, and who said there wasn’t already a place to walk?
“Unlike Pennsylvania Avenue [in Washington, DC], however, Fifth Avenue is a vital transit conduit for 38 bus lines carrying tens of thousands of people every day across Manhattan and to and from the other boroughs. Reserving two lanes for their use (and for the motorcades) would allow the other three to be dedicated to pedestrians.”
As I have said above, traffic flows fine right now on Fifth Avenue, at most times; obviously, it flows better at some times than others. There was severe traffic congestion for a day or two right after Trump was elected when demonstrations were taking place in front of Trump Tower, and there may be congestion — near, say, Rockefeller Center — around Christmastime, but even that is occasional. There are nice wide sidewalks already for pedestrians to walk on!
I have always liked the fact that, in cities, there is a mixture of pedestrians, automobiles, buses, and subways. It means one has a choice of how to get around. (I actually take a perverse pleasure in jaywalking and dodging cars.)
I like the traffic on Fifth Avenue. While strolling on the broad sidewalks north of 59th Street (cobblestone on the west side of the avenue) — with Central Park to one’s left; or, conversely, on the other side of the street, luxurious apartment buildings — I like to mix with the pedestrian throng while at the same time viewing the cars and buses as they rumble down the avenue. There’s something pleasant about realizing that not only is it a beautiful avenue, but that it also serves a purpose as an efficient conduit for north-south traffic.
I rarely drive or ride in a car when in the City. I love being a pedestrian because of the peaceful feeling, the exercise, the opportunity one has to view, at a leisurely pace, any and all sorts of interesting places and commercial establishments. Fifth Avenue is already great to walk along. So now we have to create three dedicated pedestrian lanes. For what? So that people can walk in the avenue. Who wants to walk there? What’s wrong with the good old sidewalks? They do attract a lot of pedestrians, which make them even more fun to stroll on. But, pedestrian traffic is almost never impeded, for any reason whatsoever – except for the situation in front of Trump Tower, which is not the result of Fifth Avenue being Fifth Avenue.
“Commercial traffic has already long been banned from Fifth Avenue, and deliveries by truck could continue at enhanced delivery zones on side streets during set times of the day. As for taxis, the city can make accommodations for passenger drop-offs, but prevent cabs from cruising along empty for blocks on end.”
What, in the name of God, is an “enhanced delivery zone”?
Why harass cab drivers? It’s tough enough for them to make a living, and it’s very hard to hail an unoccupied cab in the City.
Ban cars and taxis from a stretch of Fifth Avenue. Why? Every time this sort of thing is done, it creates more congestion on the other avenues which flow from south to north or in the other direction.
“This isn’t just a feel-good experiment in civics, nor is it a public transit boondoggle.”
Says who? The clueless author of this article, that’s who.
“Streets that accommodate more people are also better for business.”
Really? My wife likes to drive to shop at a fancy store on Fifth Avenue on off hours when traffic is light and parking is available. How will deliveries be made to these retail establishments?
“In a similar project I helped introduce in 2009, in the administration of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, seven blocks of Broadway in Times Square were closed to traffic, and two traffic lanes were removed between Columbus Circle at 59th Street and 17th Street, a distance of more than two miles.”
I have already noted that Times Square is unpleasant to hang out in because of the changes made by Mayor Bloomberg and his traffic commissioner, Ms. Sadik-Kahn. The public spaces, to put it kindly, are horrible. Don’t take my word for it. Go there sometime, if you can.
“New Yorkers in cars and cabs are quick to adapt to change, and drivers easily found alternate routes.”
Wishful thinking, Ms. Sadik-Khan is totally anti-car and is in la la land, so to speak, as regards transportation realities. It’s the polar opposite of (insofar as Ms. Sadik-Khan is anti-car), but the same high handed, autocratic “we know what’s best for the public” attitude that the urban designers who were totally anti-pedestrian, of the 1950’s had.
Drivers in NYC are always looking for alternate routes. Why foist on them the burden and aggravation of having to look for more?
Shutting down a stretch of Fifth Avenue to vehicular traffic will force a spillover of traffic to avenues further east, such as Park, Lexington, and Second Avenues, which are already clogged.
“The expansion of rapid bus networks in the city and the opening of the Second Avenue subway mean that there are more alternatives than ever to driving in Midtown Manhattan. Turning Fifth Avenue into a bus- and pedestrian-friendly corridor can be the next step: It would not only solve the problem of the Trump Tower jam but also encourage more people to walk, use the growing bike share system and enjoy the better bus service.”
In other words, let’s get rid of cars, which will supposedly force people to walk, ride bicycles, or take the subway. A utopian, impractical scheme. I myself prefer to walk or take public transportation. But, as Jane Jacobs wrote in The Death and Life of Great American Cities, “automobiles are hardly inherent destroyers of cities”; they are not bad. Many people prefer them. Others need to use them. And, cars and vans are an efficient way to make deliveries.
“… [T]his transformation of Fifth Avenue may be that sweet spot where urbanism, transportation engineering, democracy and politics can align.”
This is purple prose and pure nonsense. Pray that her loony idea never comes to fruition.
******************************************************
P.S. An op ed page should be a place for divergent opinions. But, really, what were the New York Times editors thinking when they published this piece? Does it echo their thinking? I have a sneaking suspicion that it does. Social engineers are always trying to retool institutions, overhaul codes of behavior, alter public spaces, and so forth, supposedly for our “betterment,” ignoring accumulated wisdom, common sense, and the experience of life as the benighted masses actually live and experience it.
— Roger W. Smith
January 18, 2017
******************************************************
The Times Square public space
(Internet photo)
******************************************************
Below (also depicted above) are photographs of the Times Square public space taken by Roger W. Smith. It was virtually empty on midday on a recent February 2017 afternoon. The temperature was in the mid 40’s. It’s truly ugly and I wonder if the few people there are “reflect[ing] on their civic institutions.”
******************************************************
Also below is a photo by Roger W. Smith of another one of the urban “oases” (read, eyesores) created by Ms. Sadik-Khan: the Garment District seating area at 40th Street and Broadway. Hardly anyone is there, and the seats are empty. It serves mainly to create another traffic obstruction.
Garment District seating area, February 2, 2017 (photo by Roger W. Smith)
******************************************************
Below are photographs of Fifth Avenue taken by Roger W. Smith in the early afternoon on Saturday, February 4, 2017. Take a look. Where are the “traffic bedlam” and the crowds? “[H]ome to one of the world’s densest concentrations of humanity and traffic bedlam”?
************************************************
Addendum:
I took the attached photo of Fifth Ave near 79th St. yesterday afternoon at around rush hour:
Where is the heavy vehicular and pedestrian traffic that the traffic engineers have been writing jeremiads about? They want to solve the “problem” by shutting part of the avenue down.
Fifth Avenue, January 2017 (photograph by Roger W. Smith)
–– Roger W. Smith, email to a friend, February 1, 2017
************************************************
Fifth Avenue, 12:25 p.m.; August 20, 2018
I took the above photo on Fifth Avenue in the 40’s at midday on a Monday afternoon in August 2018. Where is the traffic jam? The truth is that traffic usually flows very well on Fifth Avenue, which runs in one direction, downtown, from north to south. No traffic crisis requiring the intervention of city planners.
Adolf Dehn, “Spring in Central Park”
Yesterday was a beautiful late summer day. Central Park was uncrowded, quiet, and peaceful. Whole parts of it were virtually empty. It’s hard to believe that you are in the midst of Manhattan, cheek by jowl with some of the priciest neighborhoods.
Central Park was established in 1857 on 778 acres of city owned land in part of Manhattan that was at that time undeveloped.
Such an urban space could never be created today; the real estate developers would never allow it. But, then, no one can touch Central Park (though the developers would love to).
It’s sacrosanct, thank God.
— Roger W. Smith
September 14, 2016
*****************************************************
photographs by Roger W. Smith
I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, a great photographer (my niece Alison B. Smith is), but I love — am fascinated by — the quality of light on a summer morning, whether it’s in the city or the country.
Today, I made a point of going for a walk very early to see if I could catch the early morning light.
— Roger W. Smith
August 4, 2016
photographs by Roger W. Smith
Now I am curious what sight can ever be more stately and
admirable to me than my mast-hemmed Manhatta
— Walt Whitman
****************************************
photographs by Roger W. Smith
re:
“New York’s Sidewalks Are So Packed, Pedestrians Are Taking to the Streets,” by Winnie Hu, The New York Times, June 30, 2016
*************************************************
New York is indeed, as is stated in this article, a “world-class walking city.”
It’s kind of a fun article. The reporter, Winnie Hu — is there such a thing as a BAD reporter on the Times? – does a very good job.
But the supposed problem of overcrowded sidewalks in New York City is really not a problem, in my opinion — it’s a non issue.
I am always walking, practically everywhere, in the city, it seems (that’s admittedly hyperbole). I occasionally do step off the curb and walk in the street to avoid obstacles. Usually, it’s not pedestrians that are blocking the way. It could be cars or trucks illegally parked jutting out onto the sidewalk, or perhaps (often) a construction site.
Yes, certain areas are particularly crowded with pedestrians: Times Square; the Penn Station area; lower Manhattan (Broadway) in the vicinity of Houston Street and SoHo; Flushing, Queens.
But, most areas aren’t. Take Fifth Avenue, for example. It’s a major thoroughfare for locals and tourists alike with many shops and attractions and lots of pedestrians, but it’s almost always pleasant and not onerous to stroll on. This is also true of most of Broadway (with the exception of Times Square), particularly in the Upper West Side.
I walk everywhere and almost never experience pedestrian gridlock. Even on the most crowded streets.
The only such experience I’ve had in recent memory was a few months ago when the police roped off and shut down a stretch of 58th Street in Maspeth, Queens for a couple of days due to a criminal investigation. (There had a near abduction and robbery at a local business establishment.)
The traffic engineers should turn their attention elsewhere.
Some people love to fret, complain, and worry about any and all perceived inconveniences, but, believe me, the walkers can and will continue to do just fine.
— Roger W. Smith
June 2016
Below are photographs of the main research library, New York Public Library, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets, New York, NY.
A wonderful place — to visit; to do research; to find books that are long out of print; to read and reflect; to restore one’s sanity.
There’s no other public library like it.
Attracts readers and visitors from everywhere, yet never feels crowded.
Open and welcoming to all. No fees or permissions required.
Knowledgeable staff ready and eager to serve you.
Incredible resources.
— posted by Roger W. Smith
*****************************************************
photographs by Roger W. Smith
I took this photo in April 2016 on 42nd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. Manhattan is a wonderful place.
The New York Public Library — a surprisingly uncrowded, peaceful facility that invites study and scholarship, that welcomes and affords pleasure to the user, and that is staffed by knowledgeable librarians ready to assist you — is to the left.
— posted by Roger W. Smith
June 2016
Roger Smith's New York 