Last Friday, I had the pleasure of meeting Henry Stern, aka StarQuest, former Parks Commissioner under Guiliani, and founder of NY Civic, "part-watchdog, part-cheerleader." (I hope I got that right - if he reads this and I've got it wrong, there is sure to be some kind of correction asked of me. What else to expect from someone who wanted to make sure I understood the difference between "prevaricate" and "equivocate" and yes, I was embarrassed.)
Other than feeling like I was engaged in the kind of conversation that my privileged liberal arts education had prepared me for (and prepared me for somewhat miserably, I might add), the whole experience was enlightening.
See, I think in this day and age with the deluge of media and information, bad news makes news news, and news about development is the kind of news that people love to hate. When I asked StarQuest about his idea of "good development," he named Rockefeller Center, the Empire State Building, Chrysler Building, Lincoln Center, and thought Atlantic Yards was a great idea.
His perception of everything that was going on only made me feel that it is even more difficult than I thought (and I did think it was extraordinarily difficult to begin with) to separate the wheat from the chaff when it comes to understanding the good and the bad in NYC development. Perhaps this is too simplistic.
But in the gluttony of real estate pornography, it's good to know that there are some simple principles that persist, especially in real estate. First, it always looks worse than it is, but it looks particularly bad before anything has been built and everything is abstract. Second, humans are very very good at adapting to change. Third, cities do change. All we can do is hope that we increase the odds in favor of respecting humanity for the broadest group.
3.27.2006
StarQuest
Posted by Shin-pei at 8:18 PM
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4 comments:
and fourth, henry stern, the parks commissioner who vociferously supported traffic in central park, is a little bit batty, clueless and working under mid-20th century assumptions that aren't going to serve the city well in the coming years.
Can one say that he is clueless? He's not the only person I talked to that offered "good" projects that I assumed he/she would oppose. Conflicting arguments do exist, as well as personal and professional conflicts about what is being developed. My assumptions about urban development ideology went out the window last week.
I meant to ask, can you tell me more about why you have this opinion? I have only met him once and I've only read some of his articles.
Stuff like this... It's somewhat understandable for a DOT commish to want to keep cars in the parks. It's not understandable or a parks commish to have that same opinion.
T.A. Our view on cars overnight is that by prohibiting cars from driving there when there's plenty of room on other avenues, you advance the idea of park traffic as the exception rather than the rule. With cars banned overnight, they would only be allowed in the park for two short periods each weekday We could see some early morning car-free time during which people could use the park for before-work exercise.
H.S. I understand. You argue the point well. But I think it better to convenience some people when it doesn't do anyone else any harm. Traffic could be a safety measure for others in the park late at night. With regard to the morning, I think that with the bike and jogging lanes that we have, and the relatively fight traffic during the early morning, we've already achieved a good balance of uses.
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