Posts tagged Nyc Dot

  • Grander Army Plaza

    Brooklyn’s Grand Army Plaza could be a terrific public square.  Qt the northern end of Prospect Park, it was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux to be a gateway to Prospect Park, and features a beautiful arch modeled on Paris’s Arc de Triomphe.  Keep reading…

  • Closing the bowtie

    Times Square is one of the most crowded pedestrian areas in the city.  As I covered over a year ago, the Times Square Alliance, the local business association, suggested closing the cutover between Seventh Avenue and Broadway - the “bowtie”, to create additional pedestrian space between the two avenues. …  Keep reading…

  • Good riddance ugly planters

    Times Square is crowded.  At almost all hours, the sidewalks are full of pedestrians.  But that didn’t stop a bunch of buildings from installing large planters or other barriers after 9/11.  They ostensibly kept potential terrorists from driving up to the buildings, but more often (i.e. almost constantly) kept potential pedestrians from having room to…  Keep reading…

  • Freeways that never were

    In the 1950s and 60s, urban planners were busy constructing freeways across America, through plains and mountains where they were needed, and into the centers of cities where they bulldozed vibrant communities and hastened sprawl and urban decay.  Keep reading…

  • Gowanus tunnel?

    In The Power Broker, Robert Caro describes the Gowanus Expressway as one of Robert Moses’ first of many terrible highway projects.  He ran the highway right down the center of Sunset Park, completely covering the then-vibrant Third Avenue despite the neighborhood’s pleas to run it closer to the waterfront.  The Gowanus needs to be replaced, and since the…  Keep reading…

  • Bravo Gale

    For many reasons, some known, some not known, the New York City Department of Transportation is still mostly stuck in the SimCity Classic phase of urban planning thinking, closer to Robert Moses than Jane Jacobs.  While they did recently suggest, to the surprise of many observers, converting a segment of Willoughby Street in Downtown Brooklyn to be pedestrian-only, DOT Commissioner…  Keep reading…

  • Good ideas almost everyone wants

    The New York Times came out in favor of congestion pricing.  Local business leaders want it, activist groups want it… but Bloomberg still doesn’t.    Keep reading…

Browse by month

GGWash is supported by our recurring donors, corporate supporters, and foundations.

See Our Supporters Become A Member