Photo Friday: Streetview Circa 1889

Oh ninteenth century, how the proud drawings of your creations rule. As does your attention to detail. I submit to you, on this Photo Friday: a visual tour of Broadway in NYC circa 1889. The Mail & Express newspaper published this block-by-block pictorial directory of buildings and businesses along Broadway from Bowling Green to Columbus Circle. It's sort of like a visual yellow pages and map in one. (Come! Cruise Broadway! What a civilzed environment to shop and do business!)


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

These images can be browsed in the New York Public Library's Digital Gallery, and have been made available through their awesome flickr page. I highly recommend clicking on a few to check the buildings out in higher resolution. Here's one I like showing Trinity Church.

Broadway's New Agreement

Lou Kahn wrote, “The street is a room of agreement.” Today, New Yorkers can celebrate a new agreement for Broadway.

After a test period, and despite less impressive improved traffic-flow than initially hoped, New York City has wisely agreed to make the plazas around Times Square and Herald Square permanent. The plazas, in addition to better bike lanes and pedestrian improvements, have converted Broadway to a truly multi-functional street befitting the 21st century city.

This democratizing of Broadway represents the forward-thinking planning enabled by Mayor Bloomberg's administration - the progressive DOT commissioner Janette Sadik-Kahn - but also their willingness to involve truly thoughtful planners, such as Denmark's Jan Gehl. Bravo Broadway.

Manhattan Traffic Experiment Gets Permanent Run (NYTimes)

Photo credit: Sean Marshall / Creative Commons License