is New York City dead?

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.

I had the same commute. Bushwick to East Harlem. L to union square than the green line. Sometimes I found myself wishing I would just spontaneously die.

Interesting, ian. I don’t have too much experience driving in manhattan but when I’ve done it I didn’t have a good time.

inviting him the purest james dolan move i can even fathom

an absolute piece of shit on so many lavels

the knicks will lose tonight and it will be Trump's fault.

I'm going to see Maya Rudulph in Oh, Mary. I heard she sings a Belle and Sebastian song.

wow, 10 block radius around MSG closed off

feel bad for the bars in that area hah

Just walked out of oh Mary. Thought it’d be smart to walk to Bryant park for the 7. Insane crowds in the streets. And no train to queens due to struck person. Taking f instead. Wish me luck.

Good luck! I was in midtown Manhattan today and didn't notice anything, weirdly.

How was Maya Rudolph? We saw it with Jinkx.

She was great but also seemed very Maya. Like I could hear Cole in it too but can’t imagine anybody else.

Earl the Pearl Monroe lives In Harlem, has had lots of surgeries , and does good things-

From NY Times article about former Knick Earl the Pearl Monroe-He had facts and figures to share about the Earl Monroe New Renaissance Basketball School a charter high school in the Bronx, founded in 2021 by the Peabody Award-winning New York filmmaker Dan Klores, with Monroe as its patron. Monroe said that 75 percent of the roughly 40 students come from single-parent homes, and 15 percent live in homeless shelters. He pointed out that last year’s graduating class, the first from the school, had a 100 percent college acceptance rate. When they entered the school, those students had an average reading level five grades below that of their age group, but by the time they graduated, they had jumped six and a half grade levels.
In a testament to its success, the school will open a shiny new campus in August in the South Bronx, in the poorest congressional district in the United States

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/09/nyregion/knicks-nba-finals-earl-monroe.html?unlocked_article_code=1.o1A.I2Bp.g3IHplNDkJhq&smid=nytcore-ios-share

looool the clown art thing is at my local-ish park. I went to the community board meeting last week (for a different reason--rat infestation on my block), but one of the agenda items was that the Brooklyn Parks commish (or whatever the title is) was there to take questions, and people had A LOT to say about what kinds of activities get approved for the park and the performance space there. There's community sentiment that activities and event requests coming from longer term residents/long-standing community groups are being denied or de-emphasized.

Who are we comptrolling this Election Year

none of them seem too enticing, although the challengers are said to be more 'progressive' than di napoli

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/savingandinvesting/ny-comptroller-hopefuls-held-ice-linked-stocks-they-now-criticize/ar-AA25vwAK

I voted for Goyle.

Had to pick 2 out of 4 judges, 2 of them were backed by the democratic machine, 1 of them is a super cop, the other one endorsed by teachers for choice, i.e. choice to not mandate vaccinations, so I voted for the machine picks.

Otherwise voted the mamdani ballot even though some of their competitors would likely be fine, don't imagine they have a chance.

Park over Meng.

I thought the Won/Valdez race was something I had to vote on but I live on the edge of the district and have been redistricted in and out of that over the years, so not mine right now.

As we arrived somebody was bummed because the "knicks 'i voted'" stickers weren't arriving until 10am.

lfg

Mamdani won BIG. Not only did his endorsements sweep, they won by huge margins. Valdez may have been among the "lowest" with a solid majority (well over 50%) against multiple opponents. But the others on my ballot secured 60 to 67% with about 95% of ballots counted.

Going into today, I knew early voting turnout was LOW, and there was virtually nobody else when I voted. AOC's election came to mind - her upset was partly the result of a very low overall turnout, meaning more passionate voters (basically those who were voting for her) could make the difference. That may be what's happened here - low overall turnout but those looking for change were fired up and voted.

The one big incumbent that held on against challengers was the comptroller, but I don't think that was really a competitive race. It says a lot that Mamdani and many others didn't bother to endorse anyone in that race. Having two challengers that were closely matched torpedoed their chances as well - apparently many in their circles (which overlapped a lot since they were actually neighbors, friends and one-time colleagues) were bewildered that both of them chose to run against each other, which basically ensured that no coalition would really develop around either of them and prevent any serious momentum.

nyc is voting like a super liberal european city we just don’t have the green party here :]

drew warshaw was handing out flyers in front of the union square whole foods yesterday and it seemed like he was there by himself

I had no idea my district was called "commie corner" LOL. The only depiction of an American flag in my home is an ironic re-creation on a concert poster with "GANG OF FOUR" emblazoned on top, so I guess that tracks.

canadian-born david frum, who lives in DC, opines:

https://i.postimg.cc/7PKBjQR4/frum.jpg

i'm not sure 'settler-colonialists' is quite apropos just now

Imposing their rule on ... the people who voted for them?

one progressive loss for us was Grace Meng beating Chuck Park.

Bronx voters don't seem to mind (and or maybe support) Ritchie Flores 110 % support of Israel. He got like 70% of the vote. Maybe they think he delivers on other issues for them.

I voted for Michael Blake, but somehow his campaign was pretty invisible. I despise Torres and don’t know why he retains support.

Blake has run for every position under the sun and has never managed to convince people that he should do the job. Any job. Man needs to get paying work and take a break.

I seem to have won my county committee race though it was down to single votes! lol off schedule primaries are brutal but counterpoint more turnout would have brought more moderate/establishment voters and then my opponents’ name might have mattered more?

I canvassed for Blake like 15 years ago on behalf of Citizen Action. He didn’t win then either.

wow congratulations in orbit!

in office, more like!

congrats in orbit!

Haha thanks all!! It’s my fourth time in this 100% volunteer office, not the start of an exciting political career. I just have had uncontested primaries before and this time partly due to poor coordination on someone’s part we actually had to be on the ballot for this exceedingly niche role.

But the REALLY good news is that the reform faction of the county party infrastructure *should* have the votes this time to vote out the corrupt party chair and actually begin to make the party responsive to the ppl of Brooklyn! This is like 20 years in the making and feels HUGE.

Blake has run for every position under the sun and has never managed to convince people that he should do the job. Any job. Man needs to get paying work and take a break.

Ryan Busse tried this in Montana this year; ran for governor last time (I voted for him), got blown out, ran for the House this year (I did not vote for him), got blown out. He needs to get a job.

Our longest serving District Leader (every district has 2, formerly 1 man/1 woman though the gender divide has been reformed and now it can be any 2 ppl) is also one of those people who desperately wants into the local political machine and has run for EVERY office possible and is deeply uninspiring. To my great satisfaction he not only lost his seat but he ALSO recruited two of the four people who were running against me, and they both got the LEAST votes out of a field of 8 people. GET IT DONE.

They were family members of his. Probably just put their names on a paper as placeholders and they weren’t really invested and didn’t campaign.

my state assembly district was swept up in the DSA wave :)

my state assembly district was swept up in the DSA wave :)

Congratulations y’all

Wish we’d get a better potential candidate in NY15 then. I don’t get the sense that there’s a deep well of support for Ritchie Torres, just that he gets reelected out of habit. I see plenty of anti-Torres graffiti.

And congrats in orbit! Now I’ll go back to lurking until I post again in a few years or so.

Haha. Yes Torres is deeply unsatisfactory but seems to have support. It's unfortunate.

Holy shit, Julie Milner managed an upset primary win for Queens Civil Court bench, and I can only imagine not enough voters paid attention to that race because it's a colossal fuck-up. Just a quick rundown from a local paper:

The New York City Bar Association rated candidates Edmond Wong and Edward Irizarry as “approved,” and John Ciafone and Julie Milner as “not approved.” The Queens Bar Association gave “qualified” ratings to both Wong and Irizarry, a rating of “not approved” for Ciafone and a “not rated” designation for Milner, indicating she did not participate in the rating process.

Milner and Ciafone are perennial judicial candidates running as insurgents in the race for Civil Court. Milner has run for the court each of the past two years while Ciafone has mounted three unsuccessful bids for the court, as well as a failed run for a spot on the City Council. Both are attorneys.

In 2024, the Eagle reported that an X account under Milner’s name had featured a number of posts supporting issues championed by the far-right, including bans on LGBTQ+ books – which she called “filthy, pornographic smut” – in school libraries.

On at least two occasions, Milner appeared to call for the execution of President Joe Biden on her X account.

“Impeach, remove, indict, execute,” Milner tweeted twice in January 2023 in response to posts about Biden’s alleged improper handling of classified documents.

And this:

Milner came in second without receiving the support of the city bar association. She represents a countervailing force in Queens Democratic politics, having been endorsed by the East Elmhurst Democratic Club — led by disgraced former state senator Hiram Monserrate, who was expelled from the legislative body after he was convicted of misdemeanor assault against his then-girlfriend.

sucks. in my cursory research all I could see what that she was endorsed by "teachers for choice" which was enough to know she was no good, but I know a lot of neighbors didn't know enough about the judges.

Before the polls closed, Wong actually thought something like this might happen, though he was also worried that he would lose too. (He was pleasantly surprised that he got the most votes.) It's always a troubling sign when turnout is low, but with the judges, you also have to factor in a lot of voters skipping that section altogether. Ultimately a bad candidate just needs to link up with enough groups who will form a rock solid voting bloc, and that alone will be enough to overcome any opposition which is unlikely to build with a low number of votes coming in.

When I was still living in Chicago, I remember an op-ed in the Tribune asking people NOT to vote for a judge who had a horrendous record of abusing people appearing before the court. That guy still won re-election by a solid margin. That experience was enough to get me to pay attention to judges, and I always make the effort to vote on everything. But it's tough enough getting people just to vote, period, let alone in every race.

judges shouldn’t be elecyed

tbf judicial appointments have been pretty horrendous lately for obvious reasons.

Typically in NY the judges are funneled through party channels onto the ballot, and there are only ever the same number of candidates as there are openings, so your vote (or withholding it) is worthless.

Via https://www.newkingsdemocrats.com/judicialelections

The current system for electing judges is broken and heavily influenced by political party County Committees, including the Kings County (Brooklyn) Democratic County Committee, through law and custom. The County Committee leadership benefits from their grip on judicial elections in multiple ways: it can give them sway over the employment of court staff and appointment of court-ordered financial guardians and incentivizes judicial candidates to make monetary contributions to their campaign accounts.

How did Millner win when she was one of the two people NOT endorsed by the party channels?

Right but how did she even get on the ballot when there were only two seats open? I've never seen a Brooklyn ballot with more judge candidates than there were seats, is my point.

Yeah, that article's overlooking a huge loophole, because as mentioned above Milner was on the previous two ballots and Ciafone (also dubious) on the previous three, and neither was ever approved or endorsed by their registered party.

I'm not sure what's going to happen in the general election, I just hope there'll be a less-heinous alternative to Milner (and that Wong fills the other seat).