Travel Studies

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		My Life’s Stairs Fire Escapes, Stoops, “healthy” stairs, NYU stairs by Tonya Stairs are the medium for many aspects of life in the city. Although they are generally used to travel from destination to another, you can also sit, dance, and talk while on stairs. Michael Sorkin, in Twenty Minutes in Manhattan, reiterates the words of Jane Jacobs in that the stairs throughout New York City "... more
		My 20 Minutes (in Manhattan) by Woles Last year I lived at the Corner of Clinton and Stanton Streets on the Lower East Side on the top floor of an Old Law tenement, and each morning, like Sorkin, I had a 20-minute walk from my room to class. I did not take the exact same route each day, but carved my route out in response to that morning’s specific traffic... more
		Human Behavior Dictated by Architecture The Stairs and the Elevator by frances When I first enter my apartment building I walk up a double flight straight staircase with an intermediate landing. I then arrive at a quarter space landing, where I turn right to ascend another flight, find myself at another landing, make a 90 degree turn, walk straight the horizontal distance of the flight, make another... more
		Southbridge Towers: Living in a housing cooperative Making NYC affordable for my family by sesamebun I live in Southbridge Towers, a housing cooperative that was built in 1971. My grandfather had jumped from living in California with my great-grandfather and then DC to finally settling in NYC. He and his family were one of the first families to occupy this housing cooperative. When my grandfather applied to live here... more
		The Appeal of Chelsea An ode to my neighborhood by Mina In “Twenty Minutes in Manhattan,” Michael Sorkin discusses several neighborhoods, so I thought I would use this opportunity to talk about my own, Chelsea. I moved into my apartment on 24th and 6th three years ago. My building is just a block away from the Flatiron District, Madison Square Park and a... more
		Cast Iron SoHo and the X factor of historic preservation by Ism2021 Historic preservation is a laudable program both in concept and practice. Some of the most beautiful buildings and districts in New York have been saved due to the Landmarks Preservation Commission. The principle that newer is not always better is the basic foundation of the commission and is proven when the older... more
		The Stoop The stoop nowadays seems to fall short of what it used to be by Mechanical I have always heard much about this idea of ‘the stoop’. Though I’ve never really experienced it personally, memories from TV shows like Hey Arnold! or Everybody Hates Chris have given me the impression that stoops were used as generic hangouts or as go-to places when having a... more
		The Panoptic Regime Contesting Freedom of Expression and the Right to Assembly by Batman A main theme discussed in the first half of the Twenty Minutes in Manhattan is of course the appropriate allocation and uses of public space. Yet what I found especially fascinating in this discussion was Sorkin’s critique of city management – a city that he believes acts as a “panoptic regime... more
		Engineering Serendipity There's an app for that by Phi Guy Debord's dérive is a walk through the city with no clear destination, intended as a playful experience of space as well as an exploration of the walker's own psyche. Serendipitor is an iPhone app that helps you achieve... more
		Fields of Gold Living in a Beach Front Resort in the Middle of a Cornfield by Batman Waterfronts may be almost entirely absent in the big ideas of the 20thcentury city planning, but they certainly aren’t from neighborhood development in the middle of the Midwest’s corn and soy bean fields. “Not since waterfronts served as commercial ports and transportation hubs have they figured so... more
		My Little Home on the Hundredth Floor A short essay about life in my sophomore year dorm room by Clare Having grown up in suburbanesque Pasadena, California, living in New York has been an adjustment to say the least. For the last nineteen-or-so years of my life I have lived in the same one-story house on a residential street with just my parents, and brother before he departed for college. Thus, when I moved here, everything... more
		Waterfronts - Developing lower Manhattan's East River waterfront East River Park/Promenade, East River Esplanade, and Pier 15 by sesamebun I live approximately 3 blocks away from the East River so I have easy access to the waterfront. I normally take Peck Slip down towards the pathway underneath the FDR drive but there are other more obvious routes, like walking down Franklin St or taking the bike path from the South St Seaport. In Rybczynski's... more
		The Necessary Eyesore A Brief Look at Scaffolding in New York City by Biz Last week, life that I knew on E.7th and Avenue A changed dramatically. It's an exaggeration but that's exactly how I felt, sitting in my kitchen, reading a notice from Helm Management that was slipped under my door, the bangs and clanks and noise of construction bellowing from outside my window. In short, the... more
		The West Village Manhattan at Its Best by msquared In New York, a city where architectural styles are in a perpetual state of evolution, the charm of a classic, brick apartment building is not to be overlooked for a moment. Lower Manhattan is full of buildings of this type, which are typically walk-ups with hardwood floors and exposed brick on at least one wall inside... more
		Architecture's Role In Consumerism Tracking the Marketplace by frances The malls that I grew up going to make me extremely anxious. I find that the air is stuffy and that time slows down. For whatever reason, I feel that the sales people are almost fake. There are no windows to the outdoors, only windows to more and more merchandise. In the major department stores it is a maze to find an... more
		Town and Gown College towns and the creative class by Phi Both Mayor Bloomberg and President Sexton agree that the university is an economic boon to the city. As the formerly powerful sectors of finance, insurance, and real estate (or FIRE) begin to decline, Sexton claims that "our intellectual, cultural, and educational (ICE) strengths--already... more
		Playgrounds for the Rich Fancy Parks in Fancy Places by Daniel The first chapter of Makeshift Metropolis details the increasingly-realized plan for Brooklyn Bridge Park. The sprawling scheme currently starts at the termination of Atlantic Avenue, where there is a dog park and a few piers with rolling lawns and athletic courts. The middle of the park is still in the early... more
		What do we need? What do we want? by BigEcho In Makeshift Metropolis, Witold Rybczynski devotes the last two chapters of his book to The Kind of Cities We Want and The Kind of Cities We Need. He asks, “In what kind of cities do we want to live? Compact or spread out? Old or new? Big or Small? (258) He explains that the post-modern... more
		The Paseo Colorado Pasadena's Outdoor Mall by Clare Paseo Colorado, located on Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena, California, is the replacement for a failed shopping center created in the 1980s. With a series of murders, abductions, and rapes, the mall was not an attractive destination. A standard inside mall, the former mall was a hallmark of the 80’s colossus... more
		Holyoke Mall at Ingleside Reminiscing on a pretty lame suburban mall by asif I grew up in a city in which there were very few reasons for visitors to come. However, one thing that did draw in the crowds from miles and miles away was our big claim to fame- the Holyoke Mall at Ingleside. A fifteen minute drive (if there was traffic) away from my parent’s home, it is what Witold Rybczynski would call... more