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I was speaking to some friends in New York City over the weekend and they said to me, "you know what Brandon, we don't really go out at night anymore. It doesn't feel safe. There are homeless people everywhere and they've started to get very aggressive, particularly against Asians."
They live in a good neighborhood in Manhattan.
I was somewhat surprised to hear this, but at the same time, I don't think for one minute think that New York City is dead. But some do, including James Altucher. James moved to Florida because of the pandemic and recently penned an article in the NY Post called, "New York City is dead forever."
That didn't sit well with Jerry Seinfeld and so this morning he published a rebuttal op-ed piece in the New York Times. It has been making the rounds online today with people responding from both sides of the fence. Richard Florida responded with this tweet thread.
If you're a regular reader of this blog, you'll know where I sit on this topic. I love technology, but sitting at home all day going from Zoom meeting to Zoom meeting is not the kind of life I aspire to live. I agree with Jerry. There's no energy. In fact, it sucks the energy right out of me.
With that, I'll leave you with some more words from Jerry Seinfeld:
There’s some other stupid thing in the article about “bandwidth” and how New York is over because everybody will “remote everything.” Guess what: Everyone hates to do this. Everyone. Hates.
You know why? There’s no energy.
Energy, attitude and personality cannot be “remoted” through even the best fiber optic lines. That’s the whole reason many of us moved to New York in the first place.
You ever wonder why Silicon Valley even exists? I have always wondered, why do these people all live and work in that location? They have all this insane technology; why don’t they all just spread out wherever they want to be and connect with their devices? Because it doesn’t work, that’s why.
Real, live, inspiring human energy exists when we coagulate together in crazy places like New York City. Feeling sorry for yourself because you can’t go to the theater for a while is not the essential element of character that made New York the brilliant diamond of activity it will one day be again.
Photo by Florian Wehde on Unsplash
https://twitter.com/donnelly_b/status/1285754618547449856?s=20
I posted this chart on Twitter last night. It's from the WSJ showing new weekly confirmed COVID-19 cases in Florida, New York, and the U.S. as a whole. Now, the first thing I will say is that I relinquished my hopes of becoming an amateur epidemiologist back in April. I have no idea how this is all going to play out. But as an urbanist, it is interesting to note that back in April, many believed that New York City's urban density was a real problem and the almost singular cause of its high number of cases (despite many other big and dense cities around the world doing much better). There was also a belief (or hope) that warmer temperatures might have a positive impact on transmission rates. That's maybe why Florida was doing relatively better. But things have flipped. Cases in Florida are up and California just surpassed NY for the US state with the most number of cases. So who knows what will happen next. But what I do know is that wearing a mask isn't a big deal (I have mine with me all the time) and that big urban centers will be just fine. City Observatory recently published apartment search data suggesting that dense cities have actually been getting more, rather than less, attention in the wake of COVID. That doesn't surprise me.
Nicole Gelinas' recent piece in CityLab is a good reminder that -- despite all of the debates around COVID-19 and urban density -- New York City is actually a really healthy place to live. Part of this obviously has to do with the city's investments in public health. But the biggest factor, Nicole argues, is the city's transit network. Six million people move around New York City each day without a car. That translates into a meaningfully lower traffic fatality rate. New York State's rate is about 4.8 per 100,000, whereas Florida's is 14.7 deaths per 100,000. Taking transit (and having an urban morphology that supports taking transit) also brings along with it other benefits, such as increased walking. And I have to believe that is an important factor. The obesity rate in New York City is thought to be about 22%, compared to a shocking 42% for the country. All of this rolls up into a life expectancy of about 81.2 years for New Yorkers, as of 2017. This is compared to 78.6 years for the US as a whole.
I was speaking to some friends in New York City over the weekend and they said to me, "you know what Brandon, we don't really go out at night anymore. It doesn't feel safe. There are homeless people everywhere and they've started to get very aggressive, particularly against Asians."
They live in a good neighborhood in Manhattan.
I was somewhat surprised to hear this, but at the same time, I don't think for one minute think that New York City is dead. But some do, including James Altucher. James moved to Florida because of the pandemic and recently penned an article in the NY Post called, "New York City is dead forever."
That didn't sit well with Jerry Seinfeld and so this morning he published a rebuttal op-ed piece in the New York Times. It has been making the rounds online today with people responding from both sides of the fence. Richard Florida responded with this tweet thread.
If you're a regular reader of this blog, you'll know where I sit on this topic. I love technology, but sitting at home all day going from Zoom meeting to Zoom meeting is not the kind of life I aspire to live. I agree with Jerry. There's no energy. In fact, it sucks the energy right out of me.
With that, I'll leave you with some more words from Jerry Seinfeld:
There’s some other stupid thing in the article about “bandwidth” and how New York is over because everybody will “remote everything.” Guess what: Everyone hates to do this. Everyone. Hates.
You know why? There’s no energy.
Energy, attitude and personality cannot be “remoted” through even the best fiber optic lines. That’s the whole reason many of us moved to New York in the first place.
You ever wonder why Silicon Valley even exists? I have always wondered, why do these people all live and work in that location? They have all this insane technology; why don’t they all just spread out wherever they want to be and connect with their devices? Because it doesn’t work, that’s why.
Real, live, inspiring human energy exists when we coagulate together in crazy places like New York City. Feeling sorry for yourself because you can’t go to the theater for a while is not the essential element of character that made New York the brilliant diamond of activity it will one day be again.
Photo by Florian Wehde on Unsplash
https://twitter.com/donnelly_b/status/1285754618547449856?s=20
I posted this chart on Twitter last night. It's from the WSJ showing new weekly confirmed COVID-19 cases in Florida, New York, and the U.S. as a whole. Now, the first thing I will say is that I relinquished my hopes of becoming an amateur epidemiologist back in April. I have no idea how this is all going to play out. But as an urbanist, it is interesting to note that back in April, many believed that New York City's urban density was a real problem and the almost singular cause of its high number of cases (despite many other big and dense cities around the world doing much better). There was also a belief (or hope) that warmer temperatures might have a positive impact on transmission rates. That's maybe why Florida was doing relatively better. But things have flipped. Cases in Florida are up and California just surpassed NY for the US state with the most number of cases. So who knows what will happen next. But what I do know is that wearing a mask isn't a big deal (I have mine with me all the time) and that big urban centers will be just fine. City Observatory recently published apartment search data suggesting that dense cities have actually been getting more, rather than less, attention in the wake of COVID. That doesn't surprise me.
Nicole Gelinas' recent piece in CityLab is a good reminder that -- despite all of the debates around COVID-19 and urban density -- New York City is actually a really healthy place to live. Part of this obviously has to do with the city's investments in public health. But the biggest factor, Nicole argues, is the city's transit network. Six million people move around New York City each day without a car. That translates into a meaningfully lower traffic fatality rate. New York State's rate is about 4.8 per 100,000, whereas Florida's is 14.7 deaths per 100,000. Taking transit (and having an urban morphology that supports taking transit) also brings along with it other benefits, such as increased walking. And I have to believe that is an important factor. The obesity rate in New York City is thought to be about 22%, compared to a shocking 42% for the country. All of this rolls up into a life expectancy of about 81.2 years for New Yorkers, as of 2017. This is compared to 78.6 years for the US as a whole.
For more on the health of New Yorkers, check out this 2017 Summary of Vital Statistics. (It's the source of the above chart.)
For more on the health of New Yorkers, check out this 2017 Summary of Vital Statistics. (It's the source of the above chart.)
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