HALLIE EPHRON: Every so often something changes for the better.
Used to be that when you took the train from Boston to New York City, you ended up in Penn Station. Crowded dark and depressing, it was in the bowels of Madison Square Garden.The bathrooms were gross and often out of order. Its one redeeming feature was a truly superb deli where you could get authentic tasting corned beef on the right kind of mustard on the right kind of rye bread with potato salad that was outstanding. I wish I knew the name of that place.
Now your train ride starts and ends in a building across the street from Madison Square Garden, Moynihan Train Hall. It is spectacular, vast, light and airy, plenty of seating while you wait, and now that the food court has opened it’s pretty near perfect. Though I miss that deli.
Originally the city’s main post office, the building was known as the James A. Farley Building. It was among the first protected as a landmark under preservation laws created in wake of the destruction of its sister structure, the original Penn Station.
In your neck of the woods, what’s something in the landscape that’s changed… for the better?
DEBORAH CROMBIE: On a very, very micro level, our city is putting in accessible sidewalks on both sides of the two one-way main thoroughfares that run from the freeway to the town square, one of which we live on (although we face the cross street.)
This is great for so many reasons; making the neighborhood more walkable, a huge improvement in aesthetics, and for us, people no longer walking through our yard because they couldn't be bothered to cross the street to the partial sidewalk on the other side.
Downside, they're tearing out half of one of our big berms, and have broken our irrigation system. But c'est la vie, I'm sure it will all be sorted in the end.
RHYS BOWEN: Something has been changing in both places where I live. A once vibrant shopping mall has been torn down and is being replaced by multi-functional buildings–apartments or condos above retail, restaurants and with walking paths, bike paths, green areas. More like original towns used to be and everything walkable and close to public transport.
The other improvement in Marin County is the SMART rail system that links Sonoma County with the ferry to San Francisco. I’m afraid it’s not used as much as it should be but perhaps it will catch on eventually. I have yet to ride it even though it's free to over 65s.
JENN McKINLAY: When I first moved to Phoenix downtown was a wasteland. No one went down there to hang out. Other than a few bars that served patrons before and after sporting events, there wasn’t much to do.
Then someone started First Fridays, which is essentially an art walk that has bloomed into so much more. Slowly, things began to change and now downtown is quite the hotspot. My favorite area being the Roosevelt district where there’s loads of restaurants, art galleries, and live music venues.
Sometimes change is wonderful.
LUCY BURDETTE: Things are always changing in Key West and I often think these changes are a mistake. I am often wrong. For example, the city built a giant amphitheater a few years ago on the waterfront. Bah humbug, we said. A waste of money, they won't use it! But they do use it, all the time, for many different kinds of events.
Ditto with the brand new Truman Waterfront Park. John and I poo-pooed it, but it turned out to be lovely and heavily used.
So I guess the lesson here is don't ask me!
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Lucy, I’m like you; I tend to be very suspicious of change. Although, even I had to admit replacing the creepy old motel and empty trash-collecting lot on the Portland/Westbrook line with a Market Basket and some other great stories was a vast improvement.
The best change in my community has happened over the past 10 or 12 years. Portland has been the locus for a lot of immigration and refugee resettlement, which has brought a lot of exciting and much needed diversity to our area. We have far more interesting shops, restaurants, and neighbors than we used to!
In an adjacent town, they’ve closed off the main street which is lined by restaurants, and now it is a pedestrian area. It’s like a big festival every weekend, with everyone eating outside and strolling.
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: One of the things that’s happened in our neighborhood, and all around Boston, is outdoor dining. When Covid threatened restaurants' very existence, they got wise and moved their tables outside.
Now, as soon as the season begins, restaurants take over the sidewalks and allow diners to eat outside. They have tried to outdo each other with gorgeous settings, trellises festooned with flowers, and flowering trees, and heaters and canopies and umbrellas, and all kinds of things to make it festive.
Now, as soon as the season begins, restaurants take over the sidewalks and allow diners to eat outside. They have tried to outdo each other with gorgeous settings, trellises festooned with flowers, and flowering trees, and heaters and canopies and umbrellas, and all kinds of things to make it festive.
In an adjacent town, they’ve closed off the main street which is lined by restaurants, and now it is a pedestrian area. It’s like a big festival every weekend, with everyone eating outside and strolling.
There are downsides to it, I know, parking is curtailed, (for better or for worse), and local merchants who are not restaurants say it has affected their businesses.
But it is such a wonderful way to feel that the community is open again.
On the other side, someone build a house next door to ours. We had a huge open space on one side of our house, a green lawn, and the owner of it sold it, and now there is a house. It has inspired me to maybe write a novel about it. And not a happy one. :-)
HALLIE: I'm sensing a theme here: public walkable spaces. So what about your neighborhood, what's changed for the good? And are you a converted fan or did you anticipate how good it would be?
As Hank mentioned, the growth of outdoor dining is a wonderful change . . . .
ReplyDeleteI absolutely agree. in Brooklyn where my kids live there are outdoor eating areas that are covered so you can eat there even in the rain.
DeleteHallie, a couple of months ago I had to go to Johns Hopkins so took the train from Albany to Baltimore. Moynihan Train Hall was an amazing improvement over the crowded, steamy, dirty Penn Station, though I too missed some of the little shops. I wanted some New York bagels and though I walked all over the hall during my layover, there didn't seem to be anywhere I could buy one. That made me cross. However, otherwise it was great. (Selden)
ReplyDeleteSadly the food in the new Moynihan Train Hall is more like a mall food court. Which is to say no authentic bagels (or corned beef sandwiches). And it's all pricey. But at least it's there.
DeleteI’ll Have What She’s Having”: The Jewish Deli
DeleteNovember 11, 2022 - April 2, 2023.
This was an exhibit at the NY Historical Society. They may be able to find out the name of the deli you remember. It may have been a secondary location of one of the well-known ones, a lot of them are no longer around.
One of the things we love about Braga (and Europe in general) is the outdoor dining and pedestrian areas. Plus the yesteryear (in US) practice of having street level restaurant, bars and shops with overhead apartments. From a book I read in college and that impressed me greatly, that is responsible for a lot of neighborhood safety., because day and night there are eyes on the street.
ReplyDeleteThat's an interesting benefit I hadn't considered. Though ifyour apartment was right over it, you might not be so crazy about the noise and possibly smell.
DeleteWe'll, there is that. Especially at Festas celebrations. 🤪
DeleteAs for an improvement near us, one of the main avenues goes down to the river, and this year they widened the walkways on both sides of the street considerably and put in bicycle paths and more zebra crossings. More trees and flowering bushes, too. So it's all very pretty.
ReplyDeleteMore places to walk! So essential to a good urban area.
DeleteI live in a lovely walkable small city with brick sidewalks downtown that were new maybe twenty-thirty years ago during a major update. Nice, historic-looking, but the bricks are prone to buckling and get slick with ice. Now the town is fixing them! people with strollers and the mobility-impaired will be safe again.
ReplyDeleteWe also have a number of nineteenth-century homes that fell into near ruin. One by one they are being gutted and renovated by developers. Yes, it's pushing up the cost of housing, but at least they aren't being razed and replaced by McMansions.
Also, a number of us noted the absence of all Jungle Reds at Malice this year - you were missed!
Deletethanks Edith, always weighing writing time, money, and energy! How did the conference seem this year?
DeleteThe numbers were down, but the convention ran super smoothly, thanks to the new management. Yes, the web site had some glitches getting operational, but otherwise all went well. And it was lovely to be there.
DeleteGood to hear about Malice - thanks for sharing.
DeleteI live in a suburb of Hartford where outdoor dining has flourished, increasing exponentially during the pandemic. They town changed the laws and ordinances, they changed traffic patterns and more in order to keep our town center a showcase.
ReplyDeletePrior to the pandemic, they actually expanded the center by redeveloping the area around the town hall and library. Car dealerships gave way to a larger walking area with more shops and restaurants, a movie house, a Whole Foods, a Crate and Barrel, a big Barnes and Noble, a very fancy hotel and a Cheesecake Factory, bringing in lots of out-of-town shoppers.
It's great.
that sounds heavenly Judy!
DeleteFor so long we read about moribund downtowns with malls the center of the action. Now the tables are turned. The malls near us have vacancies and turning into little theme parks (the ones that are surviving) with rock climbing walls and mini golf and...
DeleteWe have one mall that has been revitalized and I think the skating rink has brought in a lot of people. However, I rarely, if ever, go to the mall anymore. I prefer to go to my local businesses which are much closer and have free parking. But I am limited to Talbot's an I feel that is perfectly fine. I don't need to wander around to 15 different department stores to find a pair of jeans or a shirt or something.
DeleteIn my small rural town I am not seeing any changes for the better. In spite of what the locals want the state is allowing huge solar farms to be put in place. Besides affecting the view negatively some farms have had water issues and if you know anything about farming, if you don't have water you don't have much of a farm.
ReplyDeleteAnother "change" in the village is about 2 old churches. One is historic and is falling apart, so instead of saving it the diocese plans to tear it down. The steeple on another very beautiful church was struck by lightning, causing a fire that did extensive damage. The congregation has become much smaller over the years and simply do not have to money to make all the repairs needed. So they are selling it. Last I heard some development firm is interested in making it into a restaurant/entertainment venue, if I understand correctly. For reasons I am not clear about, the mayor is against that.
It's very sad to hear about the churches
DeleteThat's so sad that there no takers to preserve the churches.
DeleteI live in suburban Harrisburg PA and my township is struggling to catch up with walkability and interconnection of neighborhoods built in the 60s and 70s when each one was an entity unto itself. It will be years for this to become reality but I’m glad for the effort. I love a town like Key West where we walk or bike everywhere.-Emily Dame
ReplyDeletethat's one of the best things about Key West!
DeleteHope the improvements keep coming for Harrisburg. And I always think that in Key West, you need a car like a fish needs a bicycle (repurposing Gloria Steinem)... assuming you're fit enough to bike and walk. Parking is the nightmare.
DeleteWhen we moved to Cincinnati in 2007, I focused on nearby green space for walking the dogs. I didn't think through that green space would include coyotes and deer, but we're learning to live with them. Love the hawks swooping overhead. Love the screech owls in winter.
ReplyDeleteWe have both coyotes and deer here near Boston. We had a screech owl nesting in a tree right out front of our house for a few years runniing. Love that sound they make... wish they'd return.
DeleteWe live in a place called CBRM which is an amalgamation of all the towns in a larger land area, and under the thumb of the main city (45,000). It is a mix of the city, other small towns that have lost their identity and rural (us). Everyone pays the same taxes even though the only thing we get is garbage at the end of the driveway. The big city gets a bus route.
ReplyDeleteWhen I left home in 1967, the city was “upgrading the downtown area” to compete with the new big box stores and a shopping mall. It is now 2024, and guess what – they are still working on the upgrading of the downtown. Still few people shop there, but then the philosophy is that it is for the cruise ships.
Now to complicate things, in their wisdom they have decided not to upgrade the trade college where it is next to the university (and on the bus route), but to make a whole new enterprise – guess where – right. Downtown. No parking. It is sprawling across the already narrow two-way streets and now blocks the view of the harbour. Did I say no parking for 3000 people? They have just realized this. There is also no housing but that is another topic. I doubt these students want to spend their lunch money on a $12 cup of fancy coffee at the tourist places.
However, that is not the worst of this whole thing. There has been a call for a new library since we moved here as the current one is too small, and downtown – review that no parking problem. That was 2003. Guess where they want to put it. Right again – downtown – good for the people from the cruise ship to visit – always the first place as a tourist that I want to see. Meanwhile for those of us who live out of town, and attend some of their special events, there is – no parking! There is a lovely piece of land next to a new Abilities Center (they do catering, have a café, and are lovely people), and the soccer field and play area. There is parking, and easy accessibility. It is not far from this crowded downtown area, but has no bus stop – so put a bus top in, says I.
There are still no shovels in the ground and the costs keep going up. Doubt I will see it in my lifetime. Moan over.
Oh, Margo - this sounds like dreadful planning. And you have to live with the results.
DeleteThere's a change that's in process in my neighborhood that is causing controversy--converting a road that winds through my neighborhood golf course to a one way road for drivers and creating a wide bicycle/pedestrian lane. Many of my neighbors are NOT fans of this idea, and it does make my own return trip from my sister's house less convenient. Personally, I have always been in favor of the idea, because as a jogger, I know how dangerously narrow that hill top at the north end is. When the work began last year, the City erected a "do not enter" sign at the bottom of the hill and placed a couple of concrete blocks to reinforce the message. Within days, the sign and the blocks were gone, vandalized by unhappy (and criminal) neighbors. Now they have installed a more permanent barrier at the bottom and a permanent cement divider between the two lanes that will continue to work its way up the hill as the project progresses. I see the occasional scofflaw turning at the top of the hill, but for the most part , there is no northbound traffic. Yay!. I am so happy when I walk or run up the hill now, and feel safe taking the lane. I have to remember to go a different way when I leave my sister's, but if I forget, the big barrier reminds me.
ReplyDeleteI'd put that in the "change for good" column. As long as the detour isn't miles difference.
DeleteSad story at first but then it gets better ... way better. :)
ReplyDeleteDecades ago in my newspaper reporter days, a store down the street from our own storefront newsroom burned. The fire started upstairs in an apartment above a small independent grocery store. All I will say about it is, there were fatalities but there was no arson as the fire was a terrible accident.
Afterward, for a long time, the property felt cursed. Yeah, the building was rebuilt as a functional single-story without room for apartments upstairs. Different businesses tried to occupy the ground floor to no avail.
Then, right after pandemic lockdown, the building was transformed. The Wedgewood blue facade stands out on a street of basic beige functional architecture and greets you with whimsical elements including the lettering on the sign. Inside, it's a tea room with cozy nooks and crannies, lined with pre-owned books and surprising flea market finds. Tucked in a corner is an axlotol tank.
When I'm sipping tea in there, I feel like I'm a guest in the local wise woman's magickal hut in a fantasy novel. There's another alternative place here in town now, and I'm very impressed with how they've survived. Other similar places in the past maybe lasted a year.
I hope they do well. I need to go more often to do my part that they do survive.
good changes, in small increments - I hope so, too
DeleteGood Morning. You ask: What has changed for the good? In Tampa it still seems like progress is slow and stuck in the 20th century. Architecture and civic improvements happen and 'improve", sorta. For example, on Nome street new lights were installed. Yes, at first it felt safer until many of the lights glowed purple. We liked the 'fairy kingdom' effect, alas, now we are back to white lit nights. The water department has replaced most of the 100 year old sewer pipes in my neighborhood. When the rainy season starts in a few weeks we will see if the streets, and my front yard still have standing water after the afternoon deluge.
ReplyDeleteHallie you asked about the name of the deli in old Penn Station. Was is Neddick's?
Definitey not Neddicks's. Hope the sewer pipes do their job - we had some replaced down the street/hill from us and the result has been fantastic.
DeleteOh, the defli was...ZAFTIGS? Something like that. Oh, I do remember it...
DeleteMy husband and I live in Orlando six months of the year, and new construction is a way of life. With a million more residents predicted by the end of this decade, housing is crucial. It’s sad to see all the orange grove bulldozed for apartments and houses. (Where are oranges grown now, if not in Florida?) But the blend of ethnicities here is constantly amazing.
ReplyDeleteNancy’s
When my parents moved to Beverly Hills in 1951, there was a lima bean field nearby where there's now a massive Hilton. And a carnival came to town every year.
DeletePhoenix and surrounding valley has lost most of its orange groves to housing, too. I miss the smell of the blossoms in March.
DeleteWe had a large football stadium in San Diego - which was your typical large bowl shaped stadium with seating for 70,000+ and surrounded by spacious room for parking. Not attractive but functional. This has since been torn down and the football team moved to LA. (Not too many locals really cared). The city decided to build a new stadium for baseball in the downtown San Diego area. It only seats about 45,000 has no parking but a nice park outside the ballpark which is a good spot to view the game for free and allow your family to picnic while watching the game. They kept a large brick building as one of the walls behind the stadium seating. It is lovely and reminds me of places like Wrigley Field but the back side has lovely views of the San Diego Bay. The city allows top restaurants and coffee shops to rent space so the food is top notch. A trolley brings thousands into the ballpark which is much cheaper than local parking fees of $40-50.
ReplyDeleteI've heard very good things about SD's new stadium from my friend who lives nearby.
DeleteWe built a new fire station on the edge of the village where I live. The old fire station sits downtown and has become a community center with afterschool care, exercise classes, an Angels Closet. The American Legion bought a vacant building downtown, set up a trellised patio space behind it and have weekly/monthly events to bring people in. The sad little cafe next door to the library, also downtown, is under new ownership, remodeled, and is thriving. There is one vacant building downtown currently--I hear the cafe owners are eying it with an idea of expanding and adding breakfasts--a move which will be wholeheartedly approved by the townsfolk. All small changes--but we're a small town and they've all added up to a bustling scene (if I do exaggerate slightly) :-).
ReplyDeleteSmall changes add up.
DeleteHALLIE: Public Walkable Spaces are wonderful.
ReplyDeleteThe Union Station in Washington D.C. was just a train station when I was a young child. Now there are restaurants and retail shops inside the Union Station. Yes, it is Still a Train Station.
Diana
Great train stations are a wonderful legacy. Those vast spaces are unlike anything else. Got to have a big clock so you can meet people under it.
DeleteOttawa's population past 1 million in 2022. Despite being Canada's capital city, it still felt and acted like a smaller city until recently.
ReplyDeleteYesterday, I did post a link to the much anticipated construction of the Ottawa public library. It will be a huge, bright, state-of-the-art building, stark contrast to the crampt brutalism
1960s architecture style of the current main branch which also only has 3 levels.
Just looking at the rendered floor plans gets me excited.
https://biblioottawalibrary.ca/en/central-branch-adisoke
And post COVID, the huge festivals are bringing back the much needed international tourists. May 10-20 are the dates for the 2024 Tulip Festival. Over 250,000 visitors come to see thev1 million blooming tulips. But of course, Mother Nature may wreck the timing. Some early-bloom varieties are already open, weeks ahead of schedule.
Oh, crossing fingers! Our tulips are almost fully out, a good two weeks ahead...
DeleteWow - thanks for the link, Grace - just went to check it out. The exterior is impressive, but the INTERIOR is absolutely fabulous.
DeleteExactly, HALLIE! I go to the current main branch of OPL each week. What a contrast. Can't wait until 2026!!!
Deletewow! Grace, that is a spectacular library. If I lived close by, I think I'd move in!!!
DeleteI live in the frozen north where very little changed since the days of Evangeline. Then came 2020 and a huge influx of COVID fleers (is that a word? It spellchecked). Even though we returned for the same reason, we'd been here since the early 2000s and considered ourselves local. The newcomers, often branded as 'people from away', turned out to be just what we needed. They brought diversity, new restaurants, new viewpoints, and new options to an area that had been rather stagnant.
ReplyDeleteKAIT: I am glad the COVID fleers have brought positive diversity to your little part of Maine!
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DeleteI live in a town that is relatively attentive to repairs and even has a category on their website where residents can indicate problems of concern such as trash that hasn’t been collected, potholes, broken sidewalks, light issues, etc. They do have updates on how the issues have been dealt with, but
ReplyDeletesometimes it can take quite a while for the situation to be resolved. They seem to pay more attention to road issues that affect automobiles than they do to pedestrian problems.
There are areas where a portion of a sidewalk or road receives a temporary asphalt patch rather than usage of the same material as the original. The concern I have is that these areas are often not repaired so that the surface is level with the rest of the pavement which creates a tripping hazard for people on foot.
On the other hand, in the main areas of the town and public buildings such as the libraries there are beautiful plantings of tulips and daffodils and the azaleas, rhododendrons and flowering trees will be
in blossom soon.
There is one street that has a row of cherry trees that will have flowers in another week. I always look forward to walking under their canopy.
There are a number of stores that have been closed for quite a while and many of those storefronts are being replaced by new restaurants and bakeries that have either already opened or in the process of getting ready to open soon. The good news here is that they are smaller, independent businesses
So much is reawakening with this spring here, too.
DeletePittsburgh put in a lot of bike lanes, starting a number of years ago. It's great for those who live in the city and eases the traffic burden. The downside is a lot of people who use those bike lanes don't understand they are on a street and should, you know, obey the traffic laws. Like stopping at a stop sign. I have to be very careful because it is just as likely a cyclist will speed right through the intersection as stop.
ReplyDeleteI see the same thing where I am, right near Boston. I am on foot and a number of times I’ve almost been hit by a bicyclist going through a red light. Stop signs are very seldom observed by either bicyclists or auto drivers. The bicycle lanes are often ignored in favor of sidewalks and pedestrian crossings and they seem to expect us to get out of their way.
ReplyDeleteOne change I desperately want is a bullet train across the U.S. I'm just so tired of flying and being cramped and miserable.
ReplyDeleteyes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
DeleteI love train travel.You don’t have the same restrictions/limitations as you do with airlines including all the extra charges for luggage. You also have plenty of leg room and the seats are very comfortable. Most stations are centrally located so you don’t have to go long distances to get to and from the airport.
ReplyDeleteThe only problem is that even though Amtrak travels all over the country they sometimes have to pull over to a siding because freight trains have priority and the passenger trains have to wait for them to pass through before they can continue.
I have traveled over a good portion of this country, across Canada and many areas of Europe and England. It is a relaxing way to see areas from a different perspective.
The high speed trains may be faster, but if you are not in a hurry, you can enjoy the views of the regular trains many of which have observation cars for the scenic areas and stop in places that would be difficult to reach by plane
In this country, we have not provided the same financial support for train travel vs air so the tracks, at least not in the northeast, can not accommodate the bullet or other high speed trains. The Acela trains are available in the north east and are somewhat faster but have geographical limitations as they only travel Boston, NY and Washington DC routes. One thing they do have are quiet cars and that restriction is enforced, at least it was when I traveled on it.
Our most recent visits to NYC for Broadway musicals and delicious food have been via our own car as Amtrak prices had skyrocketed and it was easy enough to find a good hotel with valet parking. I was so happy to hear about the relocation of the NYC Amtrak to a new station. When I commuted there for work, there was a deli near my office where I could get a fresh bagel with cream cheese, lox and thinly sliced cucumbers! On another note, sadly, Katz's Deli is not what it used to be although we still love Junior's Cheesecake for their deli sandwiches!
ReplyDeleteFor years, I took the commuter rail into South Station, Boston. As the years rolled by, what a tremendous transition that building underwent. Even today, when I venture by, there always appears to be something changing for the better!
One recent air travel marvel that I'd like to share was when I flew from Helsinki, Finland to Ivalo Airport (Lapland, Finland). I was told that I could take a bottle of water through security. So, I decided to test the system. While security did take my bottle of water from me, it was only to scan the content! The bottle was then just handed back to me, unopened! The security person confirmed that the bottle just had water in it. Here's hoping that we install that equipment at Logan Airport, Boston and everywhere else!