Seaport Myopia
How a $180 Million Parking Lot Could Change N.Y.C.’s Historic Character
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/06/nyregion/south-street-seaport-parking-lot-development.html
The proposed project is myopic, a small version of the cluster of high rises shown in the photo. It has nothing to do with the seaport as envisioned by Peter Conway and associates which was aimed at honoring ships, docks, riverfront, the sea to the world beyond.
At one time the tall ships rose nigher than the landlubber squats which serviced them. Now the cookie-cutter piles outisde the historic district exhibit the incarceration of inhabitants stacked like container megaships, inhumane, without human scale, essentially lifeless in appearance, representing rampant real estate forces ravaging urban congregations worldwide.
A $50 million dollar bribe to the museum is obscene corruption, along with the short-term design and construction jobs. The insignificant amount of affordable housing is shameful tip jar insult.
The current use of the project site for parking is cheap profiteering, while around the area there are several parks which should be matched with a large park on the site.
The historic district was a gift to the public and should not be profaned by commercial real estate opportunism. Already there is excessive commercialization of the docks and the former fish market which has little benefited the hard-strapped and valiant museum. The slow decline of the museum and district from its originally inspired formation is dreadful, it shows deliberate neglect as if aiming at a sellout rescue in cahoots with the increasingly RE handmaiden LPC.
Mr. Conway deserves to RIP.