NYC’s smorgasbord of fascinating delights is only equaled (some would argue surpassed) by its fascinating annoyances. Even putting aside the major nuisances/ complaints that this city is notorious for–everything from congested roads and sidewalks, noise and pollution, to the high cost of living,–there still remains its (what I term) little bureaucratic eccentricities. If only because these remaining points of contention further accentuate, whether directly or indirectly, this city’s more significant problems they’re somewhat even more annoying.
Many New Yorkers are losing patience with the city’s latest bureaucratic eccentricity. Begun in May, it’s only two months old but quickly wearing thin: fading, both physically and visually, as an attraction and assuming that woebegone appearance which is symptomatic of a hasty idea that probably looked good on the brainstorm drawing board but was doomed to failure in the real world: the Pedestrian Mall in Times Square.
Maybe the problem is all the people sitting in [the Pedestrian Mall]…New York is a city of walkers, not sitters; a city of motion, not repose. In Times Square, tourists should be looking at New York…caught up in the swarm of activity and lights and commerce and theater; instead, New Yorkers find themselves looking at the tourists, a cordoned-off display of the temporary sedentary.
Mayor Bloomberg, full time zillionaire/ part time politician/ lugubrious master of noblesse oblige machinations, gave his approval to this project as a way to have people (mostly non-New Yorkers) come and bask in the glow of Times Square, while not doing much of anything else. Vehicular traffic would be out, pedestrians in, with Times Square cordoned off and excluded from its fair share of traffic (of course, resulting in a disproportionate share of traffic in the surrounding area). Looking like a cross between a crime scene and a massive garden party that toppled to earth from out of nowhere, the area, comprised of lawn chairs occupied by an assortment of idlers, is demarcated with yellow tape fastened to orange barrels.
“The landscape designer Diana Balmori said she thought of the makeshift mall as a kind of “tidal marsh,” a place where the land and water push up against each other, and it is not clear which will take over. For Ms. Balmori, the phrase represents Broadway’s new tentative divide between a street for cars and a space for people. It’s also an apt description for Times Square itself, a space half-defined by the city and half-defined by the tourists who inhabit it. And it captures the people like Ms. Mia, someone living in New York but not of it, like a few of the other self-described regulars parked in Times Square that morning: a restaurant manager with a thick Argentine accent, a hitchhiker lounging on a chaise who said he lived in New Orleans but summered in Manhattan.”
Indeed, this sort of cosmopolitan/ hipster tackiness makes one recall the days of Times Square in the 1970s/80s, despite its dangers and unsightliness, with more than a touch of desperate nostalgia. While it may have been seedy in those days it was never boring: its tackiness cloaked intrigue, its kitschy-like overtones were exotic (oftentimes erotic) draperies for the sublime and sinful, its mysterious and lurid thematic was a provocation to/ for adventure.
The theatres, many of them dating back to Broadway’s Golden Age, were still packed despite the squalor. Musicals such as A CHORUS LINE, A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC, CATS and EVITA were performed and continued to run for many years: culture persisted against the illegitimacy of the heavy sprinkling of pornographic book stores, peep show arcades, sleazy boutiques and decrepit movie theatres. The famous walked shoulder to shoulder with the lowly, the fashionable and well-to-do with the threadbare and destitute, and, in spite of its contradictions, Times Square continued to hold its head high amid the rush of crowds, traffic and neon lights.
Perhaps, in those days, people were able to reach a temporary compromise with NYC’s contradictions (its beauty and ugliness, its artistry and devilry, its wonders and disappointments, because this was New York; they didn’t have to bask in their own egos but preferred to observe the exhibitions rather than becoming one themselves while seated upon incongruous lawn chairs. Not that the Times Square area should have remained in its formerly depressed state…but not to have a tackiness that seeks an artificial tranquility replace a squalor that was at least in rhythm with the district’s ambiance.
“We’ve come to accept the multitudes of adjectives that rotate in and out of use for Times Square depending on the era: gritty, dangerous, commercial, touristy, kitschy, overpriced, overcrowded, flashy, tacky, corporate. But peaceful?”
Related Post: Broadway Slumming.
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July 7th, 2009 - 3:10 pm
How bizarre to see people sitting in lawn chairs in Times Square. When I first saw the photos, I thought they must be waiting in line for something huge, but upon reading your article, I’m just thinking … “huh????” It’s incongruous.
As you know, I adore your writing. Here are some delights from this piece:
“…little bureaucratic eccentricities”
“…Looking like a cross between a crime scene and a massive garden party that toppled to earth…”
Too fabulous!!!
July 7th, 2009 - 7:55 pm
I think that NYC is in the midst of being transformed into a sort of ritzy banana republic; an international hub no longer for lucrative commerce and cultural innovation but a trendy, custom-designed flop house catering to wealthy nomads. Less and less office buildings are being built and, while many businesses have either failed or moved out of town, more and more luxury high-rises appear to sprout up overnight.
The famed Ground Zero remains a Big Hole in the ground, many buses/ trains are in disrepair, even more sidewalks/ streets are cracked and litter-strewn, and, in short, while the city as a whole is assuming a lean and hungry look, these Times Square cosmopolitans luxuriate amidst the ruins.
Thanks, Suzann…however, I wish your comment/ my reply concerned a topic that wasn’t as depressing as this one certainly is.