greenway

by sam on 05/28/2012

Back in the 1930s and 40s, when cars were an up-and-coming thing and still used primarily for leisure, someone (Robert Moses, naturally) had the ‘inspired’ idea to build a series of highways along the waterfront in NYC. Of course, immediately afterwards, driving became a means to an end, rather than and end unto itself, and these highways served mostly to cut off the largely pedestrian residents of new york city from their waterfront, and generally turning what should have been a lovely area into a giant eyesore. In the past 10-15 years, the city has sought to reclaim the waterfront for pedestrians, extending the west side greenway the entire length of the west side of manhattan. some spots are more developed than others (the 30s near the west side rail yards is still, well, rail yard detritus), but otherwise it’s now a lovely park, bikeway and pedestrian route.

Yesterday, I had the brilliant idea to take a walk down to see the ships for fleet week, which then turned into a walk all the way down to 18th street. I’m really glad I’ve got today off to recover from the sunburn. No individual descriptions, but the walk starts out at 72nd and Amsterdam, heads down the greenway toward the Intrepid and the other ships in town for Fleet week, and ends at Chelsea Piers, where I stumbled across the intro to an Indian wedding.