is New York City dead?

NYC seems genuinely out of fashion for the first time in my life, and maybe its history? Williamsburg is a punchline, Manhattan both above and below 14th St is just rich fuxors, seems like everything that used to happen in only NYC or LA now happens in LA or some other ascendant metropolis. I am not particularly worldly or sophisticated or mobile these days so I can't offer much more evidence, this is just my lay observation. What u think?

New York isn't dead.
There are still lots of great things about this city.
The things I value might not be the same things others value, of course.

https://saysomethingvague.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/lcd-soundsystem-t-shirt-losing-my-edge.jpg

no you're dead

okay

I mean, IDK, I was out in bushwick recently on a saturday night and it still seemed happening and teeming with young artsy cutting edge types brimming with energy. However it's been rough for a good amount of time now as far as being a city that young people without a bankroll or a professional job can live in, and that definitely cuts into the creative energy of the city some. I mean I don't even think the bronx offers the kinds of rents today that could be had 20 years ago in brooklyn.

like if you mean "dead" as in "no longer can birth a 'scene' the way it could in the 60s/70s/80s/90s, that might be true just because rents are so high.

I think that is what I mean. Although "scene" sounds a little tinny/reductive, scenes kind of matter. A city births a scene which creates stuff that matters.

Is Paris dead? How about London? Those cities are pretty expensive too, and have been for some time. New York is still a place that attracts ambitious young people, including artists, and I don’t expect that to change anytime soon.

well yeah, I mean a scene as in the beats or the greenwich village folk scene or disco or no wave or whatever. Like the combination of cheap living and high density and educational and arts institutions and economic activity that allows for a scene that actually produces something of worth. Like I just don't think there are many corners of the city left where a bunch of musicians could live close to one another and work more or less full time on their music and pay rent waiting tables part time or whatever. And to the extent such pockets exist, they're scattered at the edges of the city instead of centralized.

All cities are dead because culture travels faster through the Internet than it ever could geographically.

Rising rents making it hard for young people to live there unless they're being bankrolled is basically true for all major international cities now. Even Berlin's getting expensive these days.

But hey, there are always aspiring artists with trust funds, so the city will never die

i don't know the deal w/rents in NYC but i find it funny when people come out to L.A. from there and rhapsodize about how comparatively inexpensive the rent is here.

I don't go out much anymore, so maybe there's some lively cheap shit I'm missing out on.

It's also really hard for some people in late middle age (w/out a LUCRATIVE CAREER) to live here.

I'm also old and have a family and work a lot, and I just don't really know what's happening anymore. When we went out in Bushwick, we saw some local DJs/electronic artists in a little club and it was absurdly packed and seemed pretty alive.

I guess another thing I've noticed is that galleries tend to show artists from all over the US and world, and I'm guessing that's more true than it used to be. But that's also an internet-erasing-borders thing.

All cities are dead because culture travels faster through the Internet than it ever could geographically.

― treeship 2, Tuesday, February 6, 2018 3:28 PM (thirteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is pretty otm

it's all about the rust belt, my friend

we eat the cheeses here too

they are artisanal

our cities are the envy of all, their livability is primo

Here's how I think about New York, after my last visit there last summer:

New York is good and the only actual large city in America on the metric of everything existing there. Big cities are the ones where there is everything; you can tell Seattle is a small city because there are things that are not here.

New York is bad in that it smells of garbage. In the summer, hot garbage.

If more American cities grow to populations in the millions, New York will be more dead by comparison due declining uniqueness. Is this going to happen? Who knows.

i kinda want to leave, but i have a job i like okay and an unusually fortuitous living situation. there's no real reason for me to be here; i don't partake of the cultural opportunities available

it'll probably be the subway that finally drives me away

NYC: where if you can make it there as a successful artist, you can also have a successful time crowdfunding your medical bills.

Telecommuting will finish it off.

Less of a joke, not as dead as San Francisco?

Feels like people have been waiting for a rust belt/flyover city to take over since our traditional metropolises are more 'playground for the rich' than ever but I still don't hear kids looking to move to Columbus or Pittsburgh.

Have the media decided where the New Portland is?

There was a Tooze tweet recently, where he showed stats on how professional actors in the USA, vastly outnumber coal miners. I forgot by much, but it was significantly much.

I do hear murmurings about ppl aspiring to move to Pittsburgh, Detroit, Denver, a few others

According to @BLS_gov and @TheEconomist there are 51,200 people employed as coal miners in the US v. 785k in 1920. In 2017 there are more florists, actors and personal fitness instructors than miners. pic.twitter.com/m913tHokI2

— Adam Tooze (@adam_tooze) January 2, 2018

Less of a joke, not as dead as San Francisco?

Feels like people have been waiting for a rust belt/flyover city to take over since our traditional metropolises are more 'playground for the rich' than ever but I still don't hear kids looking to move to Columbus or Pittsburgh.

― louise ck (milo z), Tuesday, February 6, 2018 6:27 PM (seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I hear rumblings about Pittsburgh now and then. Also tons of my friends moved to Philly over the years and it did seem to be producing bands at a good clip for a while.

And no one talks about how many administrative assistant, secretarial and receptionist jobs were lost in NYC due to automation, because... women, a lot of woc. Breadwinners for their families. Fuck coal miners and their sooty tears.

I’m moving back to new york soon bc of my job but it’s not a nice place to live.

I still have my apartment in Astoria. But I really don't want to go back. I dread having to deal with the subway.

The subway is inexcusably unpleasant

i get more anxious/aggro in nyc in my old age. i don't know what it is. impatient. people bug me more. i think its just a case of the olds. i will always love the city though. in general. i've loved hanging out there my whole life.

it really is me being set in my ways. we stayed in brooklyn one summer with the kids and i seriously didn't want to leave the hotel room. get on a subway to go to a museum in manhattan? kill me now.

Everything here is comically more stressful than any other place.

I car commute to the suburbs now and it's glorious to not be taking the subway anymore

Why is the ceiling always dripping down there?

Second and third tier cities could attract people by just showing how messed up the MTA is in their promo material.

I haven't lived in nyc full time for almost two years now. I miss it, but I really don't miss it. Just the thought of having to take the subway to work gives me anxiety.

Part of me really regrets accepting another job here. As a teen my dream was living here but it’s not that fun.

NYC misses Yerac and Znarf

Fix the subway and get rid of GOP madness and I am there!

fuck the subway, i drive most places now. and when i do take the subway it's in the middle of the day.
sorry can't do anything about the GOP.

Do you have to go in and out of manhattan a lot or no?

I remember taking the subway maybe 1-2 times a month when I worked in Williamsburg. It was the best. My tweety truck got sold like 3 years ago.

i've honestly not experienced the subway horrors that many have, but i will say that the subway is nearly unusable on nights and weekends

just not enough trains

I want to get myself to love it again.

Not the subway—the city

The last job I had there, I almost had a breakdown every time I took the subway. I would sometimes using the plodding R so I wouldn't have to deal with the insaneness of the 4,5,6 during rush hour. That train really has the worst people to be stuck with in the tunnel.

I do drive into the city regularly. Many mornings I drive in and drop my wife off at work and then drive home. It helps that we live near the Manhattan Bridge and her office is in chinatown. We also might drive in and park for any number of special events.

it's fine -- we'll still be here whenever you get here

maybe

made a barely perceptible snow angel in carroll gardens:

https://i.postimg.cc/L5XCXj4j/iamanangel.jpg

New York governor Kathy Hochul withdrew a proposal that would have amended vehicle and traffic laws to effectively legalize robotaxis in the state outside of New York City. Hochul spokesperson Sean Butler told me: “Based on conversations with stakeholders, including in the legislature, it was clear that the support was not there to advance this proposal.”

🙏

so pathetic

https://i.postimg.cc/K4SrzCkN/bafkreiewx2hgdysvp77rg5ygsai3jyf4gvlgmmjbmygi6xbp2d4j55guji.jpg

where do we find this "worse"? How can I get some?

hearing recently that there's dog poop in the snow, just saying

Such a pessimist. Today it is snowballs. Tomorrow it could be marshmallows, flowers or money. Or better!

heh

gotta see both sides

https://www.amny.com/news/congestion-pricing-judge-rules-trump-unlawful/

congestion pricing survives trump, yay

turns out that nyc is incredibly dirty when the snow melts

not even talking dog shit, but just in general

the rivulets of rain from a few nights ago was something to see!

It's like a glacial moraine, depositing dirt and rocks and twigs from all the windstorms and all the tree seed pods that have blown off in the last 2 months as the ice sheet recedes.

lol I remember the great dirty thaws well. Even fondly (from a distance). The city reassuming its natural form.

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/new-york-salaries-jobs.html

https://12seasons.nyc/

lots of smoke in Midtown

https://www.instagram.com/p/DV_T9inAOTN/?img_index=1&igsh=aGQ0ZjZ1Mm91ZzVm

damn

co-worker's wife saw the smoke from Williamsburg and made him come home

Uh ok sure

https://i.ibb.co/B2ww1zDh/Screenshot-2026-04-10-at-5-50-25-PM.png

tbf Albania is the New York of Southeastern Europe.

its nice that hes still out there doing weird shit, attempting to shield himself from prosecution for his many crimes

thought the Turks and Albanians hated each other?

new york city, baby

If he's really Albanian he might be able to get a job as a building superintendent in NYC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhXDcxAM0zc

So this means pretty much anyone can get an Albanian passport and citizenship? No background checks?

I feel weird about seeing Cheers clips in this thread.

also coach really looks like hell there : /

He died two weeks after that aired

Nicholas Colasanto, that is

;_;

also coach really looks like hell there : /

― mookieproof, Friday, April 10, 2026 11:53 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

recently learned that he directed some episodes of columbo

If he's really Albanian he might be able to get a job as a building superintendent in NYC

could also work at a pizza place

fast track to a guest verse on an action bronson album

Grim observation from Nelson George posted today - I'm still green because even when I saw this for myself, the context never occurred to me, i.e. the timing as to why I'm seeing it happen:

I can always tell the day "the package" arrives on the Bowery, because I see passed out men all up and down Delancy Street and inside the Bowery subway station. It doesn't matter who the Mayor is, who NYPD assigns to the area or how hot or cold the real estate market is when "the package" hits the Bowery men fall from grace. That's one thing that hasn't changed in New York.

stop it you’re making NYC sound cool again

https://cdn.abcotvs.com/dip/images/18880487_041326-wabc-plaza-redesign-img.jpg

better than nothin i guess

my proposal is to take the roads out of the middle of the oval everything goes around the perimeter

lag∞n 2029

its an honor to serve as mayor of nyc the big apple baby

at least we know you won't do the whole 'the yankees *and* the mets are my favorites'

god cuomo was just utter garbage on every level

i liked when bloomberg pretended to be a yankees fan he put the bare minimum effort in

de blasio was a red sox fan right? you might have a chance

yeah but i don't think he was *also* a celtics/patritos fan. gotta draw the line somewhere