A metaphor for whatever you're thinking.

If you think this building is funky looking, wait until you see the people who walk out of it. The sidewalks of New York City are teeming with creative types such as architects, painters, writers, actors, musicians, photographers, and those “artists” in Fringe Festivals who wildly gyrate in bubble wrap to the sound of airplanes landing. A real city can bring the funk in every aspect, including and especially architecture. So savor the recently opened Cooper Union Building, which swells above the sidewalk like a lustrous wave suspended in a permanent state of praise and criticism. When Oscar Wilde observed, “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about,” he was referring to the situation the Cooper Union Building—designed by architect Thom Mayne—will forever occupy. Some love it. Some hate it. Some love it because it is hated. Some hate it because it is loved. It’s architecture’s equivalent of the Rorschach Test. But everyone is talking about the Cooper Union Building, and that, one some awkward level, is a success.

Check out these articles (and entertaining comments), on Curbed, the New York Times, Treehugger, and Walking Off the Big Apple.

Fall Fits New Yorkers.

Fashion Week is officially behind us, but its presence lingers around New York City like perfume in the back of a taxi. Intriguing perfume, but the kind you can’t afford. Or even identify. Is that pond water and licorice? Whatever. Drew Barrymore likes it. So we do, too. And now, with autumn here, it’s time to update your wardrobe. No pressure. But if you can’t look good in the fall, you can’t look good in any season.

Tree stump neck? Wear a thick scarf. Love handles, big hips? Don a shapely jacket or sweater. Bad hair day? Everyone understands what the wind down eastern facing avenues and what knit hats do. But your nose is pink. Your cheeks are flushed. And, you can still wear sunglasses as you saunter down the sidewalk in your heels or boots that add three inches to your height. Winter is brutal, but fall in New York is invigorating. So buy those shoes. Get out. Enjoy the leaves changing color in your local park. Fall is here. So is fashion. Everything is peaking in New York City.

Drug dealer and bookie communication device.

New York City ages well. Stoic pre-war buildings line fabled streets above tangles of rusty cables in damp tunnels from forgotten infrastructure of long ago. This city has character, and that sense of history and lives lived often makes New Yorkers adverse to change. It’s a sign of respect for those who lived here before us. Don’t build anything new if it doesn’t significantly improve what is currently there.

So what are we going to do about our city’s pay phones? Time has a way of making everything unnecessary, and time is running out on our pay phones. As a practical matter they are no longer needed, but they do represent a bygone era—a period before iPhones and wireless technology when people had to memorize phone numbers and carry around loose change to call a friend. For now, pay phones are still around, though generally ignored by the public. The day will come, however, when they begin to disappear, one by one, relics of a generation kids today could never understand. Unless we keep pay phones around. At least a few of them. Just to let future New Yorkers know we were here. And that we talked. And that we listened. And that, when we called, we actually had something to say.

Perfectly good shoes no longer fit this new life.

Purchasing a mattress in New York City is often as complicated and messy as buying a used car—another industry with bombastic commercials and quirky pitchmen. The “twin” size mattress, such as the one in this photograph, is really only big enough for a single person. Based on the shoes and luggage, the person who slept on this mattress was an adult male. Perhaps he has moved on in life. Perhaps he has found someone with whom he will share a bigger mattress. Someone who apparently didn’t like his taste in shoes. Moving on requires sacrifice and compromise. Good luck whoever you are.

Sidewalks are graveyards for outdated technology.

Few people know that the best way to clean a keyboard is to run it through the dishwasher and let it air dry. Many New Yorkers, however, don’t have dishwashers. Perhaps the owner of these keyboards didn’t either.

TV and Crutches

Crutches and Junk

What better way to follow up a post about sidewalk accidents than a post about discarded crutches? No one knows the value of a taxicab more than someone with an air conditioning unit in their arms or someone on crutches. New York City is a terrible place to be injured, and having to navigate old sidewalks, crowded crosswalks, and pre-war staircases will test anyone’s stamina and desire to live here. Nothing makes one feel more alone than being hurt in a big city.

There is, however, hope. Despite what others say about New Yorkers, they do give you their seat on the subway, they do offer to carry your loaf of bread and rotisserie chicken while you hobble down the sidewalk, they do ask how it happened—and you are free to lie in your answer. Most people do. It doesn’t matter. They’ll just ask the nearest doorman for the truth, anyway.

These discarded crutches demonstrate that yet another New Yorker has—hopefully—survived being injured in the city. So the next time you’re injured and someone offers a subway seat to you, take it. They’re not giving you something. They’re probably paying back someone else.

Sidewalk Liability

It’s unfortunate, but it happens: people sustain injuries on our sidewalks. Some cases are tragic and irreversible while others are laughable and shamelessly motivated by greed and a false sense of entitlement. Whatever the case, New York City sidewalks are arena of liability, and often times, as reported in this New York Times article, determining just who is responsible for what can be complicated.

One thing, however, is certain: where there are victims, there are lawyers.

Lots of them, waiting to swoop in like knuckled vultures and pick clean the carcass of another’s misfortune. The vultures are everywhere, perched on the building ledges and street lights above New Yorkers, waiting for someone to stumble, knowing that out of 8 million residents, the sidewalk will inevitably take someone down. Personal injury lawyers are indeed a special breed of people, and perhaps none is so specially bred for New Yorkers than “Sidewalk Injury” attorneys.

Here is a Guide to New York City Sidewalk Accident Vultures (below each clickable firm name is a quoted highlight of their own characterizations of sidewalk injury issues):

Andrew L. Weitz and Associates, P.C.
“Just walking the streets of New York can be dangerous — as we all know too well. The potential danger constantly underfoot is … the pavement itself.”

Tolmage, Peskin, Harris, and Falick
“Big Apple Pothole and Sidewalk Accidents — New York City’s sidewalks, like many of the cities in the Northeast suffer from potholes. Potholes are a type of urban acne caused by the freeze – thaw cycle.”

Greenstein & Milbauer, LLP
“Don’t be a Victim Twice — New York City Slip and Fall Accident Attorneys — New York’s streets are so poorly maintained that city lawmakers have devised strategies to minimize litigation costs resulting from trip- or slip-and-fall accidents.”

Frekhtman Associates
“New York Municipal Accident Attorney — 866-ATTY-LAW — Cases against the City of New York (NYC) may include:
* Slips, Trips, and Falls on a public sidewalk…”

The Offices of Lawrence B. Saftler
“If you live in New York City and suffer a sidewalk trip and fall accident, the law protects you. Contact lawyer Lawrence B. Saftler to understand your legal rights.”

Blank, Goolnick, & Dittenhoefer
“Municipal Premises Liability Attorneys ● Trip & Fall Injury ● Slip & Fall Lawyers— Personal injury cases based on premises liability include:
* Slip & fall accidents – slippery steps, wet floors, negligent snow removal (removal of snow made a condition more hazardous)
* Sidewalk / trip & fall accidents – defective sidewalk, sidewalk depression, holes in sidewalk, sidewalk grate, uncovered manhole on sidewalk, uneven sidewalk, unlit stairwell, stairway with no handrail…”

Photo by Urville Djasim.

Banana Peel, Apple, Cup, and Plastic Bags

Banana Peel and Red Bull

Banana Peel and dansko box

Banana Stand

They’re cheap. They’re flavorful. They’re a fast meal.

Bananas.

Nothing fits the NYC lifestyle better than bananas. If you’re an observer of NYC sidewalk trash cans, you know that about one in every six Manhattan trash cans has a banana peel in it on any given afternoon. In a down economy that has people budgeting their lunch money, nothing gets citizens through the day easier and in a more economical manner than bananas—particularly for delivery folks and others constantly on the go. Convenient. Not sticky. Throw away wrapper.

It has meaning because it's from us.

It’s not what you think. Ok, perhaps it is what you think: trash. And you’re right. However, although everyone agrees that this photo is of trash, not everyone agrees what trash really means. Refuse to some. Waste for others. Opportunity for many. Hope for a few. Art to artist. Only in New York City would all of those interpretations of trash be accurate. Take these people for instance:

Justin Gignac who sells packaged New York City art.

Cynthia Chaldekas who writes about trash on the New York Public Library blog. She also has her own blog.

Brooklyn artist Swoon who inspired boats made of NYC trash.

Or this gentleman, Adrian Kondratowicz, behind anycoloryoulike, bent on making a difference and changing perception.

Not everyone, however, loves NYC trash. Like this fellow and his branches.

Newspaper dispensers, pay phones, luggage, pipes, and other sidewalk objects tell the story of life in New York City.