Part 10 (2/2)

The jobs issue pulls at the heartstrings, but what kind of jobs and for whom were never understood. Jacobs focused on this in our conversation: The jobs argument breaks down into a few things. The Lower Manhattan Expressway debate was the first time the question was ever raised as to where are these jobs? Outside or in New York? And the ones that are in New York, how temporary are they? How long do they last? The other thing about jobs is that under this kind of scheme, permanent jobs are eliminated for the sake of temporary jobs in construction.In fact, this is what New York has been doing for years: it's been cannibalizing itself for the sake of temporary construction jobs. It has lost all kinds of low-cost industrial s.p.a.ce. It has driven out-apart from those that want to leave the city for various reasons-businesses and all kinds of jobs, not only for highways but for urban renewal, for public housing, for anything.It was the expressway that I first saw this issue confronted head-on [at a public hearing], and I had a conversation with Harry Van Arsdale, who was head of the Central Labor Council. In fact, I quoted this somewhere in Economy of Cities Economy of Cities where a study of how many jobs there were in the SoHo area, before it was SoHo, and how many would be wiped out by the expressway. Van Arsdale was there with a lot of paid construction workers who were given a day's pay, they told us, to come to City Hall and cheer or boo at the right points. They all left promptly before five o'clock. where a study of how many jobs there were in the SoHo area, before it was SoHo, and how many would be wiped out by the expressway. Van Arsdale was there with a lot of paid construction workers who were given a day's pay, they told us, to come to City Hall and cheer or boo at the right points. They all left promptly before five o'clock.Van Arsdale was speaking in favor of the expressway, and I said to him, ”What about the jobs of all those people that are going to be wiped out by the expressway?” And a lot of those people are blacks and Puerto Ricans who have a very hard time getting work. And he said, ”Oh, I can't be concerned about those jobs.” And he wasn't. He was concerned with construction only. High-paid construction workers, temporary jobs. To this day, that's the basis on which jobs are talked about for Westway.

This is still true in debates on highways, stadiums, casinos, malls, and similar big projects.

In reality, highways and transit are both job creators, at least for jobs that last the duration of the construction project. The same energy and advocacy never seem to get behind the kind of entrepreneurial investment that creates long-term jobs not in construction.

An important distinction exists, however, in the jobs created by highways and transit. Most of the highway jobs are on-site, with cement, steel, and other supplies coming from distant places. With transit, more meaningful jobs and more of them can be created off-site but within the state.

In 2005 the MTA distributed an eight-page brochure highlighting dozens of subway, bus, and commuter rail parts that are made around New York State. A map of the state showed forty-four locations of parts subcontractors for subway, bus, and railcars. Diagrams of the hybrid buses, subway, and railcars identified the location at which each component is produced. The minimum number of scattered manufacturing sites was ten for hybrid buses produced in Oriskany in central New York; the maximum was twenty-eight for the Kawasaki railcars produced in Yonkers, a city north of New York City. ”The economy of the southern tier of the state is very dependent on this work, especially the rebuilding of subway cars,” Downey points out. The sh.e.l.ls of 660 new subway cars were delivered by s.h.i.+p from Brazil to the Port of Albany, for example, and trucked to an a.s.sembly plant with eleven hundred employees in Hornell, in the southwest corner of the state. The Hornell plant is producing the propulsion and gear units. All the parts work, Downey adds, is highly labor intensive. The lighting for new cars comes from Buffalo, the ventilation system from Auburn, and fabricated metal parts from Kingston and Farmingdale. The propulsion system for the new clean-fuel city buses comes from Johnson City and the sheet metal from Utica.

BEYOND TRANSIT: REGENERATION OR REPLACEMENT?.

It would be a mistake, however, to evaluate the Westway defeat only only on the basis of the enormous transit benefit from the trade-in funds. Multiple positive ripple effects are equally significant: on the basis of the enormous transit benefit from the trade-in funds. Multiple positive ripple effects are equally significant: The Westway corridor from the Battery to Forty-second Street along the Hudson River has been transformed on both sides of the roadway. Neighborhoods around the city experienced tremendous infusions of new residents, lured, in part, by vastly improved transit service. Neighborhoods around the city experienced tremendous infusions of new residents, lured, in part, by vastly improved transit service. A stronger awareness of and interest in the full 575 miles of New York City waterfront evolved or were accelerated after the intense focus on this 5-mile section. The regional transit network shared in the new system investments, improving access to the city for local users, commuters, and visitors.

9.2 One of those lovely moments with Jane, a martini break in a conversation. Stephen A. Goldsmith Stephen A. Goldsmith.

The benefits are not obvious, until one appreciates the critical and beneficial role of transit to urban life and the destructive role of highways. Few New Yorkers living in neighborhoods revitalized in recent decades connect the improved transit benefits they enjoy today to the defeat of Westway. ”The Westway trade-in and subway investment made all the difference in my life,” reports a longtime resident of Brooklyn's Park Slope. ”Before that, you could never count on getting back and forth to Manhattan to make a business meeting on time. You never knew whether your kid's lateness from school was something to worry about. And, you wound up spending a fortune on cabs at night (if you could get them to take you across the bridge), because you never wanted to trust the subway after dark. I'd say the subway improvements maybe doubled the value of my house.”

The transformation of the far West Side of Manhattan below Forty-second Street is probably the most visible testimony to the post-Westway change. What Jane said would happen if Westway was killed has, indeed, happened. ”There is so much there,” she said of the so-called decrepit area. ”Plenty of room exists for fill-in development between buildings and on empty lots. Much of that vacant s.p.a.ce certainly ought to be developed before you add new landfill at enormous expense, if that's ever necessary. And the new land wouldn't be a success until these fill-ins were done in any case.”

During the Westway debate, proponents vigorously argued that the highway and landfill development were absolutely necessary to spur the revival of this stretch of the West Side. Without Westway, the area was doomed, the experts said. They were wrong. This area was certainly ”ramshackle.” The condition was not debatable; the cause of the condition was. And Westway as the cure was a joke. As Jane said: ”What a ridiculous idea that you put in a billion-dollar highway to manicure a place!”

ORGANIC REGENERATION GETS A CHANCE.

Anyone who has observed the organic regeneration of urban districts understood how erroneous this notion was. Grand plans, for highways, urban renewal, stadia, and the like, work as impediments to authentic regeneration, and their defeat makes regeneration possible. Regeneration after defeat is not guaranteed; other conditions are necessary.

In the 1970s many properties along the route were turned into sleazy bars and illicit s.e.x spots, supporting the image of extreme deterioration. Owners waited for the big payoff that would come with condemnation. The bars served as a useful, very visual prop for Westway advocates. Mysteriously, all of these places disappeared after Westway's demise.

Something was ready and waiting to happen there, and it did-after Westway's defeat. Now, property along the West Village, Gansvoort Market, and the Chelsea waterfront is among the highest-valued real estate in Manhattan. ”The neighborhood is now part of the richest ZIP code in New York City and the 12th richest ZIP code in the country, according to a study by Forbes,” the New York Sun New York Sun reported on August 14, 2006. reported on August 14, 2006.

Many buildings have been renovated, and numerous trendy restaurants and shops opened and new buildings have been built. Too many architecturally distinctive buildings, however, were torn down, viable businesses lost, and residents displaced while the death threat hung over the area and the Landmarks Preservation Commission delayed expansion of the Greenwich Village Historic District. An expansion was pa.s.sed in May 2006. A small additional district was designated-the omitted remnants of the rich district that existed when the original Greenwich Village Historic District was designated in 1966. But even this time, certain landmark-quality buildings were omitted, enabling developers to replace them with high-rise condos.

Old industrial buildings have been converted to residential lofts in the pattern established in SoHo after the demise of the Lower Manhattan Expressway plan.6 And although residents complain that the new high-rises are intrusive and out of character, the scale of some of the new buildings-notably the three best known, designed by architect Richard Meier-are only twelve stories. This is modest for the city, especially in contrast to the excessive scale-forty stories plus-permitted in a 2005 zoning change for the industrial neighborhood of Greenpoint-Williamsburg in Brooklyn. And although residents complain that the new high-rises are intrusive and out of character, the scale of some of the new buildings-notably the three best known, designed by architect Richard Meier-are only twelve stories. This is modest for the city, especially in contrast to the excessive scale-forty stories plus-permitted in a 2005 zoning change for the industrial neighborhood of Greenpoint-Williamsburg in Brooklyn.

If Westway had been built and the new land created for development, can one imagine zoning for fewer than forty stories, and probably more with incentives? Would a wall of high-rises on a hundred acres at the river be better than what is emerging now? Most people complain about the scale of the apartment towers Donald Trump built along the river between Sixty-fifth and Seventy-second Streets, and they are lower than forty stories. Would the West Side have received zoning less than Greenpoint-Williamsburg's forty stories plus?

THE NEW PARK-BIG IS BIG The creation of the Hudson River Park along the waterfront puts the lie to the oft-repeated ridiculous belief that nothing big can get done in New York City. Even the New York Times New York Times, long an ardent advocate of Westway, noted that ”this modest park is as big an urban planning success story as anything that has taken place in New York City in 100 years.”7 Modest it may be, but it is still the largest Manhattan park built in more than a century. Modest it may be, but it is still the largest Manhattan park built in more than a century.

Not only is this already a huge accomplishment on its own terms-about three-quarters completed-but it is the largest physical change in the city's waterfront land use since the days when cruise s.h.i.+ps and commerce filled a rich a.s.sortment of finger piers. The opening of the first segment in Greenwich Village in 2003 marked the beginning of serious city and state efforts to transform for recreational use waterfront areas in neighborhoods throughout the city. New segments seem to open annually.

The first segment-a ten-acre swath in Greenwich Village-included three piers extending a thousand feet offsh.o.r.e with lawns, playing fields, playgrounds, a children's ecology stream, and a display garden, not to mention the spectacular views of the city's skyline from the end of the piers. Users disagree as to how difficult it is to cross the highway. Either way, millions are indeed crossing. Any weekend, people are coming from all parts of the city. Diehard Westway proponents argue that with the highway underground, access to the waterfront would have been better. But there still would be a road to cross, an access road, not much narrower than the present highway.

Only six years since that 2003 opening, one marvels at how much more of the five-mile park already exists, with more constantly under construction. Within some common design elements, like railings, lighting, and comfortable benches, the diversity of uses and potential experiences is remarkable. Boating options range from sailing and kayaking to touring, with more boating opportunities planned. Lawns for picnicking, sun-bathing, or socializing are plentiful. Playgrounds, tennis courts, a fabulous historic barge, and more are found along the way. Even a small, protected wildlife sanctuary for migrating birds exists with a variety of plantings and flowers to attract whatever Mother Nature brings.

Protecting the fish was at the heart of the Westway battle, and the new park seems to do this well with a generous a.s.sortment of habitat preserves. The areas between the piers are off-limits to filling and platforming and continue to function as they have for years. The piers and pilings slow the river flow and create calmer areas, providing shelter for the fish. Decking has been removed from what used to be piers, creating a series of protected pier ruins-pile fields that are both fish habitat and sculptural reminders of the waterfront's history when piers lined the water's edge, one after another. Their function as habitat is preserved; if more than 30 percent of the pilings in one field is lost, replacement is required. What is sadly missing, however, is any kind of interpretive signage to remind the visitor of some historic events and activity. This waterfront was the incubator of the city's and, in effect, nation's economy in the 1800s. Not a clue is offered.

9.3 The Tribecca boardwalk section of Hudson River Park. Albert Butzel Albert Butzel.

Nevertheless, born out of the Westway defeat, this is the greatest park development since Central Park and not just because it is the largest park added to the city since then. It is a balanced blend of new park s.p.a.ce, recreational uses, city service structures, and nearby new development. The design evolved out of a three-year planning process with definite input from the a.s.sorted adjacent neighborhoods. Because the end result reflects that input, Hudson River Park feels more like a string of contiguous but varying parks, some more pa.s.sive or active than others.

How do you value a five-hundred-acre park attracting people from all over the city? Kayakers, sailors, even swimmers can get into the water, and everyone gets close to the water. It turns out to be an incredibly well-used city park, not the neighborhood park that people expected. The waterfront-park momentum it precipitated spread to Brooklyn's DUMBO, Red Hook, Williamsburg, and elsewhere in the city. The significance of the spread of this momentum is enormous.

Unquestionably, this is a different park from what Westway would have produced. The intention was to create a pa.s.sive park on the landfill, recalls one Westway defender, who worked on the never-completed design. That meant trees, walkways, and lawns, with ball fields down around Christopher Street. Some argue that it would never have worked out that way and instead would have been an extension of Battery Park City with a continuation of the same bulkhead and uses. There is nothing wrong with that, but that is not the same as what now exists, with the variety of designs and uses in between rebuilt piers. Being out on the pier, a thousand feet from sh.o.r.e, is a unique experience. ”The piers,” one planning commissioner commented, ”are the best thing to happen to New York in 50 years.”

9.4 Hudson River Park gra.s.sy Pier 45 in Greenwich Village is a popular gathering place. Albert Butzel Albert Butzel.

Equally interesting in a diverse, urban way is the variety of residential and commercial development evolving across the West Side Highway on the inland side facing the river. An interesting mix of new and old of reasonable scale, including numerous innovative conversions of unusual commercial buildings, it is a variable stretch that changes from community to community, reflecting both the city's earlier and its recent development history. And talk about serendipitous planning-the celebrated High Line neighborhood, with its own new park paralleling the highway two blocks inland, ties in nicely with the waterside park. In fact, what is evolving along the inland side should be called ”Starchitect Row,” with buildings by Jean Nouvel, Frank Gehry, Richard Meier, and Robert A. M. Stern. None of them exceeds twenty stories, and happily none overshadows such incomparable landmarks as the Art Moderne Starrett-Lehigh Building. In fact, as a group, the recent new waterfront buildings are among the highest quality of new structures because of high design standards imposed by the City Planning Commission.

None of this would have happened if Westway were built with one hundred acres of solid, continuous park versus piers and one hundred acres of new development that would be towers like Trump's Riverside South above Fifty-ninth Street. None of the inland-side development would have happened as well, or at all, knowing that a wall of towers would be built in front.

THE TRANSPORTATION DEBATE.

Until the mid-1980s, the idea that more and bigger highways solved traffic problems still prevailed. Few observers recognized that highways through through cities and increased vehicular traffic in cities were inimical to urban life. Few experts understood how crucial public transit was to the functioning of a vibrant city. cities and increased vehicular traffic in cities were inimical to urban life. Few experts understood how crucial public transit was to the functioning of a vibrant city.

Some of this is still true. After all, word usage reflects beliefs. Officials talk about ”investing” in highways but ”subsidizing” transit. Federal funding for roads and airports is infinitely more generous than for transit. News reporters fail to distinguish between infrastructure investment infrastructure investment as code words in legislative proposals for highway funding rather than sewers, utilities, streets, and other systems, which used to be-and should still be-what the words connote. as code words in legislative proposals for highway funding rather than sewers, utilities, streets, and other systems, which used to be-and should still be-what the words connote.

The overwhelming predominance of highway provisions in transportation legislation is accepted as the norm. Some transportation legislation mentions only only highways and makes little or no attempt to fund transit. The very central concept of mobility is lost. The transportation question should be: mobility for what? Highways are designed to move vehicles; transit is designed to move people. The difference is like night and day. For mobility of people and goods, public transit should be paramount. ”Traffic engineers think of moving vehicles from point A to point B,” Jane noted in conversation. ”But the kind of mobility systems cities need-and once had-link all kinds of places within the city in multiple ways.” highways and makes little or no attempt to fund transit. The very central concept of mobility is lost. The transportation question should be: mobility for what? Highways are designed to move vehicles; transit is designed to move people. The difference is like night and day. For mobility of people and goods, public transit should be paramount. ”Traffic engineers think of moving vehicles from point A to point B,” Jane noted in conversation. ”But the kind of mobility systems cities need-and once had-link all kinds of places within the city in multiple ways.”

VEHICULAR DOMINATION STILL PREVAILS.

The deadest downtowns in cities across America are car dominated. The vibrancy of New York's bustling streets depends on pedestrian, not vehicular, traffic. Unquestionably, New York City has been much more accommodating of vehicular traffic than it was during the 1970s when the City Planning Commission was forced to clamp down on the number of parking s.p.a.ces in midtown, among other strategies, to discourage driving. This move was a response to a Friends of the Earth air pollution lawsuit in 1977, but the parking-s.p.a.ce restriction expired. Garages have not stopped proliferating since. Traffic gets worse. Every new building seems to have another enormous parking garage. The City Planning Commission maintains antiquated standards requiring too much new parking for each new building and residential unit. Curb cuts are granted for private residences on residential blocks where no garages ever existed, allowing one more suburban intrusion to erode vibrant urban streets.8 Resistance is fierce to tolls on the East River bridges, even by residents in neighborhoods accessible to transit. Tolls, of course, would impose some of the city's costs on commuters and visitors and encourage more transit use. Mayor Bloomberg appropriately and vigorously fought for this to no avail. But he was 100 percent correct to do so. Resistance is fierce to tolls on the East River bridges, even by residents in neighborhoods accessible to transit. Tolls, of course, would impose some of the city's costs on commuters and visitors and encourage more transit use. Mayor Bloomberg appropriately and vigorously fought for this to no avail. But he was 100 percent correct to do so.

Delivery trucks get bigger and longer, causing traffic jams at every corner they can't easily turn. Private tourist buses are larger and more numerous than ever and crowd out local buses from public bus stops. For the tourists' convenience, taxpaying residents are inconvenienced. Nothing is done to encourage visitors to use the subway or buses, and hotel doormen only put visitors in taxis, rarely recommending transit. Transit maps should be given to every visitor. And why not a metro card with ten dollars' worth of trips in every hotel room to introduce visitors to transit use? And why not give permit and financial advantages to smaller tour buses with operable windows and no luggage s.p.a.ce?

Police, fire, and many other city employees have free workplace parking, even though some of them also get free subway pa.s.ses and live in transit-accessible neighborhoods. If they don't live near transit, they could park at a transit locale and continue by subway. Imagine the added security if police and firemen took the subway to work like most city residents.

The parking-garage lobby has achieved enormous strength, boldly evidenced after 9/11. To ease the postdisaster traffic congestion, Mayor Bloomberg wisely and firmly required all vehicles coming over the East River bridges to have two pa.s.sengers. Garages reportedly suffered the loss of business. They were not alone, but they claimed erroneously that people wanting to shop were not coming in because of the limitation. The restriction did not last long. The garage-lobby investment in maximum vehicular traffic was never more clear until its opposition to congestion pricing.

Permit parking for taxpaying residents in neighborhoods burdened by suburban drivers-as is done in Cambridge, New Haven, and other cities-is rejected whenever it is proposed. The city's efficient trolley system and Second and Third Avenue elevated trains-called the El-were eliminated during the Robert Moses era to make more room for cars. As a result, the city has a smaller transit system than it did almost a century ago. But new replacement streetcar lines are dismissed out of hand because it is unthinkable to interfere with street s.p.a.ce for cars. New York is way behind European cities, which have extraordinary streetcars, bike-ways, and congestion pricing.

So some of the transportation ideas dating from before Westway was killed may still dominate. And some may even be worse. Nevertheless, one should not ignore the differences. The sea change is enormous. Public transit is valued more now than before the Westway fight. New York and the country could have become car-centric without Westway but not without Robert Moses. Yet in small, incremental ways, the public's desire for the return of more ma.s.s transit is having an impact as light rail systems are built city by city, section by section, and downtown sections of elevated highways are being dismantled in a number of cities.

Surely, on many levels, the death of Westway marked the end of an era. And, despite dire warnings of gridlock to come if the roadway's capacity was not expanded, traffic flows no worse than twenty years ago, heavy but manageable. And while traffic has increased, adjustments have been made to avenue and crosstown streetlights by the Department of Transportation to a.s.sist a smoother traffic flow.

BIG PROJECTS DO GET DONE.

Whenever a project like Westway is defeated, the cry is heard: ”You can't get anything big done in New York anymore.” Every time I hear this lament, I wonder what city they are talking about. Sometimes big proposals-usually for a new overscaled construction project-actually are defeated. But does that mean all big projects are defeated? Evidence indicates otherwise.

Is not the rebuilding during the past twenty years of the city's ma.s.s transit big, in fact huge and more complex than any singular building project? The ma.s.s transit system is not yet good enough, yet it is on its way. Extension of the Number 7 subway line west along Forty-second Street and downtown to Thirty-fourth Street is under way with an estimated price tag of $2.1 billion, even though the long-proposed Forty-second Street Streetcar would have made more sense. Although it would have been built faster and cheaper, it would have taken minimum surface s.p.a.ce away from cars. Horrors!

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