Category: NYC

the money shot

But, continuing the sex metaphor, getting there was at least half the fun.
Last Sunday Barry and I went to the top of the old RCA Building in Rockefeller Center. We went because we wanted to see what the restored observation deck looked like, at least as much as for the anticipated views.
We weren’t disappointed, once we managed to get by the hype of the obligatory, very flashy presentation the owners have installed on the street and mezzanine levels of this dignified, classy building. Their very distracting “trailer” even continued through the short elevator ride itself, but all this unnecessary glitz was forgotten once we walked out in front of the world which opened up outside the enclosed 67th floor.
There we found there were two still higher, much more open levels, including the actual roof itself, where nothing but the original, roughly waist-high parapet of the building stood between us and all of New York and much of New Jersey.
We did regret missing out on the comfy chairs which can be seen in pictures of the original deck, and we might have enjoyed something like the Metropolitan Museum’s simple roof cafe while we were up there (a glass of bubbly would have been perfect). In fact however we were so clear of the building’s basic structures and services that even the water lines stopped somewhere under our feet. The last WC we had passed that afternoon was 65 floors below. At least that meant plenty of room at the top for the view.
The outlook from a certain tower to the south of Rockefeller Center still has a lot to recommend it, but you just can’t see the Empire State Building from the top of the Empire State Building.
These pictures are arranged in the order in which we ascended after getting off the elevator.






like the roof deck of a dirigible

these two are rare exceptions to the classic, and ubiquitous, wooden barrel versions

everybody into the streets!

They could hardly have come up with a petty outrage more perfectly designed to get me going. Hummer, blocked sidewalk, trashy action movie: Could anything be more civilized in a crowded neighborhood on a warm afternoon?
At 5 o’clock today I was walking west on 23rd Street across from my home when I saw a shiny Hummer facing me, almost totally blocking the sidewalk. Crowds of pedestrians were squeezing through the bottleneck it presented. The monstrous red tank was on a carpet, surrounded by chrome stanchions draped with black velvet ropes, and there were at least two spotlight towers positioned nearby. To add insult to this injury the parking spaces along the curb for a hundred feet ahead were blocked by traffic cones, apparently in order to keep a view of the Hummer clear for cars passing in the street (the prol’s bus stop served the purpose in the area immediately to the rear).
I was told by a guy with “Star Theatrical Services” spread across his tee shirt that the car was a promotion for a film festival, but I suspect it was mostly only a promotion gimmick for a silly truck whose sales are currently plummeting, even if it was tied into some rude action movie playing in the multiplex behind it. There was no advertising other than a Hummer poster slappped on the movie house wall.
The guy also said they had a permit. That may be, but how does that happen in a city already choked by millions of cars routinely playing games with people on foot whenever they step into a street? I reported the installation to 311 anyway, for “impeding pedestrian traffic on a sidewalk”, which I learned is the responsibility of the Department of Sanitation. The 10th Precinct said they’d send a car by. I’m not holding my breath.

UPDATE: As I was leaving our building just before seven, someone told me that Chelsea’s Hummer show had been [taken down] just ten minutes earlier. That would put it a little over an hour after I called 311. No, I don’t know if there’s any connection. I just hope we don’t see it there tomorrow.