The Times are a Changin’
The last two months have seen some radical changes here on the Upper Westside. A bucolic neighborhood, steeped in history, a fantastic place for families. A place I’ve called home for nearly 20 years. It’s been news delivered in waves. First off, I know more couples who have decided to leave the city than at any time since I’ve been in New York. That includes 9-11 and the last financial crisis in 2008. The reasons vary slightly, but have fallen pretty much along the lines of: a) there is not enough social distancing and population density doesn’t help. b) With the schools up in the air and now more likely to be remote, they can be anywhere but here. c) It’s too expensive, where once, one could offset the expense with the delights of what a city like New York can offer, but with virtually all amenities closed, where’s the upside? d) I fear the final nail in this coffin will be the current controversy over a temporary homeless shelter for drug addicted men plopped right into the ‘hood.
For the last two months, neighborhood streets have been littered with moving trucks. Mostly it’s people leaving and not moving in. It’s hard not to wonder if these people are going to a much better place? Bigger house? More space? Less expensive? Safer?
In the last few weeks, the city has temporarily moved homeless male drug addicts into a number of once respectable boutique hotels here on the Upper Westside, so that they could be better socially distanced during COVID-19.
While it’s easy to question the wisdom of moving hundreds of these men into a predominantly family neighborhood, it would seem the issue has become more complex that it should. Sadly the whole controversy has made international headlines. What started as a story about rightfully concerned parents worried about their family’s safety has turned into a race / white privilege issue. The debate has certainly drawn out some pretty divisive views on all sides, but if we peel back the onion here, I think we can all agree, no one has a problem with homeless families being sheltered in this neighborhood, many have been here all along. No, the issue is drug addicted single men roaming the ‘hood either doing drugs in public, which has been the case (I saw it myself), many passed out on the street or harassing people walking by. In addition, the city had apparently moved a number of sex offenders into one hotel a block from a school playground (the city now insists they have been removed). Again who’s thinking these things through?
For example, here’s a picture I took today of a man menacingly brandishing a hammer in the middle of Broadway on 79th street.
I spent the last week checking this all out for myself. It’s easy to read the news stories and get angry and scared. What I found was there are certainly more homeless and vagrant like characters than I have ever seen in this neighborhood wandering around. But except for a few spots where I would not cross the road for my own safety, I did not feel unduly unsafe, but I had my guard up. Nor was I threatened.
But it only takes a few to ruin the lot. Having little kids of my own, I’m sympathetic to how people feel. They city ought to have thought this through and engaged with locals on the matter. With all the massive empty hotels in midtown where few families live, might that have been a better solution? I don’t know. One remarkable side note to this story is that the Guardian Angels, who stood in for crime prevention back in the bad old days late in the early 80’s are now incredibly patrolling our neighborhood. It’s come full circle. I guess that’s what happens when you defund the police.
With COVID-19, BLM protests, unemployment and now homelessness, many have been calling the death knell for cities. People have discovered that they don’t need to live in cramped apartments so close to work, that teleconferencing makes the office a relic of the past. We could debate if they are right, but historically they have been wrong.
European cities recovered from the bubonic plague in the late 1300’s, the deadliest pandemic in history. And what emerged from those terrible times was the birth of the Renaissance. Those same cities recovered from World War Two allied bombing campaigns. Berlin, Dresden and even Japan’s Hiroshima & Nagasaki both obliterated by an atomic bomb, now all thriving cities.
Critics will likely argue that this time it’s different. Technology has made it much easier to work from home and the fear of COVID will keep people away from the office. Hard to argue with that point. But for a different perspective, it’s worth reading Harvard economist Edward Glaeser’s Triumph of the City. He points out that most American cities faced a bleak future in the 1970’s. Globalization and automation had killed off many of the great urban industries from textiles to shipping. The car proved far more important than Zoom and allowed people to live much further from the office. Phones had become cheap and easy. Pour on race riots & crime and you had a Molotov cocktail of factors that ruined city life. And yet, cities came back to life.
They found new economic life in the service sector, in the financial markets to consulting and healthcare, despite the rise of fax machines, email and conferencing. Cities reinvented themselves in many different ways. Drawing on a simple asset – human beings like to mingle. The author noted that in finance and technology sectors for example, people gain huge advantages by being close to the action, meeting new people, being close to mentors on a daily basis and comparing notes. Much of which happens accidentally. So it’s important that we don’t rush so quickly to conclusions. Density is not entirely the problem it’s made out to be, Manhattan, the densest part of NYC had a lower rates of infection during the pandemic versus the other boroughs.
Across the country some of the highest rates are in the least densely populated areas. And looking further afield, other cities have handled COVID-19 extraordinarily well, Singapore, Taipei, Hong Kong, all dense cities with packed mass transit systems. Despite this the amount of deaths have been amazing low. Under 30 dead in Singapore, under 10 in Hong Kong. Perhaps with SARs and other outbreaks they were likely better prepared and had made investments in healthcare and hygiene. Reacted to the virus early, aggressively and intelligently. Now they are reaping the rewards. One thing is clear, bad leadership, misguided & inept policies can destroy a city. So if NYC was to fail this time around, it would be less because of a pandemic and more because of bad government. I still have hope.
I can’t help but wonder if I’ll be the last man standing. Then I take a deep breath and remind myself, this is not a death sentence. The pandemic will not be for life.
