Today marks the 125th anniversary of the Brooklyn Bridge. Stretching 5,989 feet across the East River to connect Brooklyn to Manhattan, it’s one of the oldest and most famous bridges in the world. Designed by John Augustus Roebling, the bridge is one of the city’s most treasured icons and it was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1964.
For years upon decades and countless sunrises and moonrises, New York City has included the Brooklyn Bridge (understandably) high on its list of premium tourist attractions. The bridge is located within neighborhoods rich in history, and the views from the bridge’s footpath (or walkway) and along the waterfront are breathtaking. However, while it’s (obviously) a cinch finding one’s way to the vicinity of the bridge, it’s an ordeal finding pedestrian access to the bridge itself.
While the Manhattan and Brooklyn neighborhoods leading to and from the bridge may be historically significant, these areas also saw major changes over the past 125 years. Redevelopment and construction, often ill-planned and not very far-reaching, occurred at frequent intervals over the last century, especially during the decades immediately following the bridge’s construction and over the past twenty years.
Depressed rows of countless tenements were replaced with warehouses and factories, themselves falling into disrepair and usually abandoned. Additionally, burgeoning highways and overpasses sprouted up in the 40s/50s to further clutter an already cluttered situation. The Brooklyn Bridge became somewhat lost in this inevitable yet frenzied technological growth. Tourists, endeavoring to find the bridge’s footpath were even more lost, while they wandered streets going nowhere and down lanes that went somewhere else.
The Brooklyn Paper reports that “Sign-maker Andrew Simons created a multi-faceted project that includes not just a huge map and tourist guide, but “Welcome”-mat style concrete slabs positioned at the opening of the stairwell that leads up to the Brooklyn Bridge.
But the most impressive part of the project is light artist Linnaea Tillett’s piece, “This Way,” whose network of fluorescent bulbs steer misguided travelers to their destination.”
This is yet another “Why didn’t we think of that sooner?” stories. But while “necessity is the mother of invention,” a lost tourist is the mother of direction.
Source: Dana Rubinstein, The Brooklyn Paper
brooklynpaper.com/stories/30/1/3…
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May 22nd, 2008 - 6:34 pm
“What a lovely view from/Heaven looks at you from/The Brooklyn Bridge!”
May 22nd, 2008 - 6:48 pm
Andave, this may come as a shock to you, but I absolutely hate “New York, New York”…whether sung by Ole Blue Eyes or by whomever. There’s just something about its brash, brazen rhythm that simply annoys me.
You have to come to this city one of these days, Mary Sue…hopefully you’ll have better luck than most in finding the “yellow brick road” to the Brooklyn Bridge. I know that you’ll love it.