Urbanism

Blue Cowhide

These fictional stories mix personal anecdotes, news, hard reporting, and made-up stuff. All names and characters are invented, but many of the quotes are real. These are their stories.   “These walls are blue cowhide.” Marc briefly caressed the blue cowhide wall and glanced toward the wall-to-wall bedroom windows, noticing the silhouette of his hair. […]

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Is NYC Safe?

2013 – “Is Harlem safe to visit?” 2017 – “Are the subway’s safe?” I can’t recall the number of times I was asked the Harlem question during Bloomberg’s reign as Mayor (2001-2013), and the subway question during de Blasio’s tenure (2014-2021). Usually, these questions happened on the Manhattan Bridge and near the end of a

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Glass City

What is Glass City?

[We’re renaming the Photo Digest to Glass City, about photography, writing, creativity, and urbanism.   It will be shared every other week, usually on Tuesdays, but that may be subject to change.   I always struggled with what to call the newsletter. Or perhaps it’s better to use the term column, since that has a

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Introduction

“It is the ambition of the New Yorker to live upon the Fifth Avenue, to take his airings in the [Central] Park, to sleep with his fathers in Green-Wood.” – The New York Times, 1866 Our Brooklyn neighborhood, within the larger Sunset Park, has recently been monikered as Greenwood Heights for its proximity to the

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