This blog only represents the views of the author and does not reflect the policies of the City of New York or its Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications.
Is urban “revitalization” a mere expression of cultural preference – reflecting white, upper-middle class predilections? Was the pre-revitalization 42nd Street somehow a more authentic expression of something before it, and Bryant Park, became “Disney-fied.” Essays in “Deconstructing the High Line: postindustrial urbanism and the rise of the elevated park,” edited by Christoph Linder and Brian Rosa (Rutgers, 2017), suggest that prior to its re-visioning as an urban public space, the High Line of gay cruising and wild, invasive plants was authentic, organic and more correct. In an essay in Deconstructing the High Line, Darren J. Patrick even argues that the pervasive and self-seeding, but non-native, Ailanthus altissima, had more of a right to live and thrive in the along the abandoned elevated rail line than the artificial more native, highly curated plant selection that distinguishes the High Line now.
When we were working at Grand Central Partnership and Bryant Park Restoration Corporation, we were occasionally surprised to learn that there were academics, like Sharon Zukin, who thought that we were engaged in a misguided attempt to destroy the complex, authentic social ecology of “The Deuce.” We couldn’t understand how someone might prefer the porn theaters, prostitution, unpicked up trash and three card monte of 42nd Street of the 70’s and early 80’s to what we were envisioning. Continue reading
