240. JANE JACOBS
The White Horse Tavern was,
in the, late 70's, a gem of a
place. On Hudson Street, a
few doors up from where
Jane Jacobs had lived,
before her move to Toronto,
it bore more aspects of a
'literary' soiree than a bar,
although it certainly was
that. Jane Jacobs had
written 'The Life and
Death of a Great
American City',
pretty much an
expose of her fight
and take-down, her
adventure-telling of
that long-ongoing battle
with Robert Moses,
who was intent, as
'money-lender in
the temple' on
fairly destroying
the 'local' and the
neighborhood character
of NYC, especially
the Greenwich Village
portion of it, with his
multi-lane by-ways
and highways that
would have cut through
everything, indiscriminately,
and with tolls, just so
cars and trucks could
better move through,
on a quick in-and-out
pass through, of Manhattan.
All so that his bridge and
tunnel authorities could keep
raking money in to do more.
He was against all things
which made what the city
what it was : the charm
and deliberateness of
local streets, shopkeepers,
neighbors at street level,
not in enormous, packed,
high-rises blocs of
housing (the lower east
side got that anyway,
and they still stand -
problematic, rundown,
and noisy-fierce. He saw
nothing of that vision.
Jane did, house-marm
and mother of kids,
almost an accidental
hero. Jane wanted a
New York where, at
street-level, people
still knew one another,
worked together, watched
each others kids, kept
random oversight to
neighbors and small-shops
and trade stores, local
grocers, parks and
playgrounds. Robert
Moses wanted everything
torn down, broken up,
segregated - plazas
and wind-swept places
was all he'd give to
the 'people', who
were certainly
secondary to his
viewpoint of the
commercialization
and economic
streamlining of
commerce. People
be damned. When
you see a parking lot
of 9 acres, cars, and
a half-mile walk to
the store(s) connected
to it, that's Moses.
Jane Jacobs, unbelievably
and against all odds, in
the 1950's stood up to
him. Mobilized locals,
formed community-activist
groups, stormed meetings,
and eventually they won
their case. Moses had
already done a lot of
damage to NYC, but
at least the Village was
saved and not sundered
- no highway, as he'd
planned, was cut through,
no thruways and by-passes
and mega-slots for cars
and trucks. He was sent
packing, and his plans
curtailed. The funny thing
about Robert Moses, big-
time bureaucrat and
municipal boss, doing
all this - hr NEVER in
his life had a driver's
license. He always had
drivers, supplied by
Government, taking him
around. After the
successes of her crusade
and plight, and the greater
success of her book and
story, she became a
quite-someone, and
eventually, even for
her and her family
and husband, the
city became too much
- they moved and lived,
after that, in Toronto
for many years; a place,
a city, she found more
conducive to her
particular idea of city
living, and , place,
and pace too. No
matter. 555 Hudson
Street, today completely
unmarked and non-descript,
lives on. To me, in
my mind, it was as
if she'd never left
555 anyway - not
that the crowds nearby
at a 'watering hole' like
The White Horse must
have always pleased her.
Some of my friends
threw me a 30th
birthday party there,
and then we 'groggily'
walked out to the old
Hudson River piers,
to finish the night. That
was the night one of my
friends (this would have
been late Sept. '79, I
guess. He and I shared
a birth date, but he was
younger by some 5 or
6 years.) said if he (as a
writer) wasn't famous
by the time HE was 30,
he'd kill himself. He
wasn't. He didn't.
Although, alas, he
is now, these years
later, quite dead. Back
then these piers were
derelict trysting spots
of weird village people,
endless gay men and
women , when 'cruising'
was in vogue,) all
pre-AIDS too), crowds
of dingy student and
wastrel types. There
was no commercial
pier business left,
except the dark-side
and the dark-trade.
We stayed there
most of the night,
bizarrely happy and
dead-drunk as well.
Oh to be 30 once
more. I don't quite
think Jane Jacobs
had all that sort of
thing so much in
mind with her
vision of the 'livable'
city, but she did,
I assure you, give
allowances for
such diversity,
local color, and
adventure-breaks
from the boredom
of routine, in her
large picture. that's
what made her
so real and so great.
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