New York Voices; 324

What. Whitman described New York as a city of hurried and sparkling waters a city of spires and masses. Willing Carlos Williams called the skyscrapers the moving water loving giants of Manhattan. New York is a city built on the water. Each generation has left its mark on its goals. Tonight a look at the history and the changes ahead. On the Waterfront. New York boy standard time knowing your point.

Ah New York Voices is made possible by the members of 13 additional funding provided by Michel Martin. Hello Raphael pure online and in this edition of New York Voices. We're on the waterfront. You know if the many plans that are currently in the works never become realities. The New York City coastline will be transformed once again. The trend is from traditional maritime industries to parks waterfront apartments and commercial properties. Now whether that's a good thing or not depends on who you talk to. The city recently announced a massive rezoning of the Brooklyn waterfront in Williamsburg. We'll hear about that and other visions for the future in a moment but we begin with a look at the end of an era. We all know the Fulton Fish Market but some of us may not know that it's leaving yet. It's moving up to the Bronx. The market has been at its present location for almost 200 years. So we decided to pay a visit while it was still down on South Street. Hear from the people who know it and love it best. This is a little bit like a circus or a theater. It's like a resident

theater company or a repertory company. The main thing is moving forward. But you've got to have fun while you're doing it. The fish comes by truck. All of us typically on a let us say a very busy holiday weekend. You'll see trucks beginning to arrive here midday Sunday. There may be 30 40 or 50 semis lined up along South Street between the fish market and the Manhattan Bridge. Let's walk around take a look at some merchandise as we go. Swordfish here was a little slice made out of the tail so that the buyer can take a look at the color and the character of the meat inside without having to. Dismantle a whole fish. If we're lucky we'll see some people on it. That's the exciting part to see people working on it.

Let's go. If you're in the food business. Time is money. And if you're buying a whole fish to take back to your store or your restaurant and you're taking the time to cut it yourself you're eating into your other time what you're doing here is paying a professional to produce a product far better than anything you could do in your own store or in your own restaurant. Trying to describe the fish market has tried to describe a bunch of ants running around on a hill. They each have a job. They're doing something specific but unless he was sort of live with it for a while it's really very hard to tell him. It's like combat loading of a amphibious vessel for a war. You put things where you're going to need them. Rather than where it's necessarily most convenient. The market as we know it now stems from the early part of the 19th century.

Prior to that the markets had been further south along the waterfront. By early 1830s the fish market had moved out to a shed across the southeast very unlike water side of South Street. The reason of course is that that's where the fishing boats were coming in. And the fishing boats remember did come in here until the 1970s. Most of the people that caused the bike to share are local fishmongers in the neighborhoods of New York or people that run small sometimes family run restaurants and they've been buying sometimes from the same. Vendors for generations. It's no more complicated than as a small town in fact it may be easier because you get more choices. Specializes of short fish and in Chilean sea bass. This is FRESH of the time. This. Family which is better than the

market for a very long time indeed a bike I can't even touch. Oh man. My name is nigh Miralem and I've been painting down here at the bull fish market for many years. In the beginning when I came to the phone to Mike and I did both oils and watercolors and now I do exclusively watercolor because I feel the medium is so well tuned to portraying different aspects of the market. The old buildings here are worn and shabby from from age so nothing is strange Nothing is pristine. I'm very fortunate to have my studio right in the middle of the film fish market. And when the market moves up to the Hunts Point section of the Bronx my landlord tells me that he's got space for me so I will probably be the only artist with a studio at the Hunts Point food distribution center.

Well we're all sad to know that the market will probably not be here a year and a half two years. At some point. Because it will leave a big vacuum in the neighborhood. It's now planned and in fact in process to move it to the Bronx from the Hunt's Point. Industrial park area where most of the other major. Food wholesale markets are located. So in a way it is progress moves along. We lose a little bit. We gain a little bit. We like to think that Im losing the market for the products that will be better for the fish. It will be better for the trade it will be better for New Yorkers in the long run. The sorry thing about it is that. Instead of this vibrant unique. Institution what will end up with is more retail more residents. We need them. But do we need them here as well.

As we just saw the Fulton Fish Market will be leaving South Street after nearly two centuries. Whatever takes its place it's going to be a big transformation for that little part of the New York City waterfront. Joining me now is someone who knows plenty about the endless transformation of the city has undergone over the years. Urban historian Ken Jackson. Can the Fulton Fish Market moving up to Hunts Point in the Bronx really as an end of an era isn't it. Well it's a it is the end of an era. The Fulton Fish Market has seen the ends of many arrows over its almost two century existence. But it's only movement will itself be the end of an era as well. Has New York had a history of successful reinvention of its waterfront. Well New York City has been reinventing itself almost for 400 years the water has been essential to even understanding why New York is here and. It was the water that brought the Dutch. It was the vastness of the harbor. The fact that it did not freeze in the winter time. The fact it was an island so it was defensible. The fact that you have the Hudson River which leads to the interior of the

continent and then the all water route to Chicago in the west of the Erie Canal all this is about water. This is a vast world city that's almost like Venice. It's on water. But even if you want the people of New York and the people of the country don't sort of think of New York. As a waterway city and youth it is because quite frankly most New Yorkers who don't see the water that much you know most of the projects that are now in the works are the ones that have already been realized have been turning the waterfront into public spaces into residential apartments into commercial areas that wonder if that accessibility is transforming the relationship between New Yorkers and the water. Well first of all let's remember that one reason New Yorkers were not drawn to the water in centuries past is because this was a working waterfront you know 500 plus miles of it and it was places where ships were loading and unloading good ships were being built. Frankly it was not a place where you necessarily wanted to have a picnic or jump on the water. So what we have done in the last half century and accelerating more recently in the last couple decades

is as the kind of commercial activity of the waterfront has declined for us have hundreds of guys unloading bags and boxes of things. Now it's you know one guy with a hook another guy with a crane. Just take a look. So all those jobs are gone. This harbor used to be filled with sailing ships and old transports and steam ships and everything else. And while we still see ships everywhere it's so many fewer than once we did now it's ferries carrying people and a few tankers and other things. But so much less than we would have seen a hundred years ago or even 200 years. The change of the waterfront. Through more public spaces this transforming the relationship of New Yorkers. It isn't and what's so wonderful about it is that as the city reinvents itself and loses one aspect of its past let's say the kind of commercial aspect an industrial aspect. It's really discovering. The water again so that we have this kind of Esplanade along the water now it's possible to ride your bike or walk from the George Washington Bridge all the way around. We see it in more and recreational times now. It's only now that the water is

becoming so attractive it's cleaning up. So you found fish and all sorts of stuff that you didn't see 50 or 100 years ago it's a cleaner more accessible waterfront and one of the things that none of the projects that are in the works for the transformation the changing of the waterfront one of things it doesn't have. Is plans for an increase of industrialization or manufacture. Does it have a future in New York City waterfront. Well first of all it's been one of the most contentious issues in the city over the last Middleby more than a century it's a hundred fifty years. What should the city do for industry or to encourage or discourage it or whatever else essentially New York has been. In some sort of a process of the industrialization for a century. I think we're down about as far as it's going to go that there is some possibility for industry in some of the under used parts of the waterfront let's say like Red Hook at Atlanta basin Erie Basin where there's some proposals. The real problem is you have to have. Direct access from either rail or trucks and the water. And the problem is that in Manhattan and in Brooklyn you don't really have that.

If there are any project good that is now on the table that particularly excites you. I think what's what's great about it is the attempt to build kind of a bike way and a walkway all the way around New York. We're not there yet but we have moved miles and miles from where we were 10 years ago so now that is possible really to experience the water. What New Yorkers have been pushed for toward so long is push toward the the mass transit routes and the high density and the. Expensive real estate toward the middle. What you're seeing now even though we don't have mass transit on the edges of New York City Manhattan. Now the waterfront is itself becoming an attraction. So people are bidding up the price of real estate along the water. They're putting up with the inconvenience of it's farther from the subway. I mean the subway is everything in New York right. You got to really like the water to get to it to catch a bus. But it sounds to me as always you're optimistic and excited about the prospects of the New York City waterfront. Well I think that New York City itself has shown over its 400 year life that that here this whole city really the oldest city in the United States has shown a remarkable resilience it's

completely changed its economy its population has completely churned. And yet there's something about this beehive of activity that's always open to new ideas that's always attracting people who I would say are different. Enthusiasm for life fuels you know gets energy from each other which is community. And New York is a celebration of community and diversity and humanity and I think that's its strength and that's why I'm optimistic. Well Ken as always thank you very much. Well can't talk about the end of industrial activity in New York and specifically on the Brooklyn waterfront. In our next story we look at the last vestige of maritime industry on that waterfront sanctities company American stevedoring at the Red Hook terminal. South lease is up for renewal in 2004 but the city and the Port Authority have hired a planning for him to explore other uses for the site. Back in the 50 was probably a whole economic engine of everybody you knew was somehow connected to the waterfront because of the fact

that he drove a truck on the waterfront was a longshoreman or he owned a restaurant close to the waterfront where they ate. When I started working on the water for 50 years a book along with over 3000 longshoreman working in Brooklyn there would be nothing to go to a pier and have 200 trucks waiting to unload the goods. That used to unload the ships like putting nets into the hole of the ships. And these 20 men would be filling up the nets with cargo. They would lift the nets out of the ship to the dock. Everything. Before you lifted you Paul. You did what you had to to move that cargo. Probably on the waterfront waterfront. 38 years. When container zation came in they started moving. The steamship lines out to port north to handle the containers. The port totally disappeared from New

York and Brooklyn and went out to Jersey. It was like watching the whole waterfront DK. All the Bush term. It's nothing that's galloping. Here. There used to be wooden piers. With a metal structure. And all you see is the writing that on the top. And the stumps of wood coming out of the ground would. Like to cover his term on one thousand ninety four which is the last stevedoring terminal in Brooklyn. I was working ships next to one of the stern port authority wanted to know if we were interested in taking over the lease at Redwood thermal. And I immediately said yes we have created this pier. From 1994 from 18000 containers to 120000 containers. We became the largest cocoa port states. If you were to eat a Hershey

bar. Here's a 7 percent. That that Hershey bar. Originated as a cocoa bean in my warehouse. We do various other break bulk cargo like coffee and lumber salt Pomus. It's like a fine tune and. It just runs like. Like your symphony. I have to fight for everything that we've got. Now my fight is with the city. This probably is leased to me by Port Authority and for some unknown reason To me the city decided that they wanted to see if there was a hired better use. They had a meeting that was put on by the consultants that were hired by the Port Authority and the City of New York. The current operator's lease expires in April of 2004 so a fairly short period of time from now and what the Port Authority

warrants here is. As our economy and as our city is changed. So that this continued to make. A contribution to job creation to the character and vitality of the community that surround it. These are just a set of. Choices. Next time we talk to you we're going to come back and say here's some choices we think make sense. We hear from citizens about what they want with their aspirations are what their concerns are living so close to. Iran are free to not have access to my own waterfront is something that I would hope. That wouldn't happen. Housing and jobs have been complementary in the past and must be so once again we feel that housing in the point will only conflict with economic uses on the poor. One of the great things about it is why I live in New York where these where I Love New Yorkers they care passionately. They love their city. They care about. There are neighborhoods they express it with

good energy. What is the guarantee that the people already working there will be getting employment there when these new men come in. Well we need to do is we need to have a balanced economy and good high paying jobs on the waterfront in container terminals all the way to go. I'm very very suspicious when you throw out the term jobs. I don't know how many the longshoreman still living at home. I don't know how many people who live in red have work on the piers. I'm actually thinking it to return jobs is like the weapons of mass destruction to you folks. Show them to me where I think I've become George Moore. My name is and I'm the CEO for I took a term and my business is bad and ready for my life and I don't intend to move. And if they want to take me out of that terminal they'll bury me there. Some people call me the hole that I was all that.

Because they were moving. And on the whole out here with the Brooklyn waterfront because I think it's needed. I made a pledge to my guys that they were going to have and I think. One of my. Life. For more on how the New York City waterfront should be used I spoke with Raymond gas still an urban design expert and the author of Beyond the edge. New York's new waterfront. Right what's so new about the New York City waterfront. What's new on the New York waterfront is that there's a great deal of change happening right now in the pace of change has increased since the past few decades. We've got new ferry terminals we have new parks we have new projects and all sorts of scales and they're happening throughout the city not just in Manhattan but in the other boroughs as well if you will from Staten Island here in Brooklyn. And they're the quality. There's actually a quality to the

parks and quality to the types of buildings and projects we're doing now is actually higher in terms of creativity and the usefulness to the people in New York. You talk about the fast pace of construction but we're standing on the Brooklyn prominent overlooking the future site of the Brooklyn Bridge Park that's been 15 years in the making it is we can see no ground has been rolled or what's so fast about that. Well as you know there's always you know regular speed in this New York City and there were decades at a stretch where nothing happened you know the 1970s there was like one lonely artist on the waterfront up in Queens or one lonely ecologists down on the you know what's north of Battery Park City today. So when we talk about a pace of change there are the speed of like something like The New York water taxi that's beginning to actually operate you know that it just went ahead and happened after a couple years it took a while but it's operating now. Those things are happening at a pace that you know there's approvals there's like a recognition that there should be service at the waterfront access to the waterfront Esplanade get built on the west side so things are happening at actually a distance these

days. When will there be a park here. Let's give the benefit of doubt and say they'll be a park in two thousand six or seven. Let's say that that's actually possible when you actually start building. If you look at the examples in New York of Esplanade and the other kind of waterfront projects once the permit is really underway don't take that long. I mean they moved an incredible pace on the Hudson River Park once it was finally all ready to go. That like here it took a long time but once everybody says yes. People make it happen. Now there's another big plan that's just been proposed to change the waterfront of Greenpoint Williamsburg. Tell me a little bit about that. Well that's a different kind of thing because there that's a plan which is likely to change ultimately the zoning and the uses. Basically the city and the community take the position they don't want to be an industrial waterfront anymore at least not that kind of industrial waterfront. They don't want waste transfer they don't want power plants. And so what they're trying to do now is say you know we're going to let the actual waterfront part of this fall under waterfront zoning and fall allow a kind of housing development connected with a have a

waterfront walkway or Esplanade about 1.6 miles you said that the city has decided that they don't want an industrialized waterfront. I mean is that a good idea do we need at least in part to industrialize waterfront. I think the larger question is you know do you want the edge of the waterfront to just be park or can you let other stuff happen and the answer is you gotta let other stuff happen. Well let's talk about that we just saw a piece about the last vestige right of the traditional maritime industry over their operation. Was it inevitable. That that graph into three doors a longshoreman and loading and unloading of ships was it inevitable that that was going to disappear from New York. Well there is and some things are inevitable. Depends what you're reading. If you read a study by an economist It says you know the ports subsidizing this it's never going to work it's too small it doesn't meet contemporary standards of board activity going to sit back and say well it is the job of Economic Development Corporation and stuff to find out if there's a better way. But you know that's a study there's a lot of people that would argue these are going concerns

they were we are making money within the framework of our lease and how we were you know so why take this business away if it's a legitimate economic activity. I think there will be continue to be some port activity happening here in Red Hook. But how that happens what its nature is whether it's really successfully minutest with sort of urban regeneration. It's very hard to say it's a tough in other cities of the world. It's a tough thing it's been done. But it is a tough thing to actually have you know industrial port activity next to a changing district. You've got to recognize the waterfront is not just a front yard. It kind of has to do the back yard stuff too and that also includes all these amazing people that are sort of up and down all you know the amphibious people and once they're back in for that water every day that there's no place for them in this picture. We haven't done our job right. Women On The Waterfront throughout this program we close with a slightly different perspective. If you look at the waterfront from the Hudson River.

They run many programs of great kayaking here in downtown boathouse. People just come up off the street. And we put them on the water we put them right out in the river. The plan today as I explained before we go we're going to go across the river to Hoboken a current but I at least that is I'm in pretty now and should be pretty easy trap. Those of us who lived in the city. Look out at this beautiful river here. There was no way to get to it couldn't get down get in the water anyway. So we got this idea will start a kayaking project. And not just for us. Do it for everybody. All our programs and basically everything is run by volunteers. You don't get any state federal or city funding. The volunteers who work here use their own money. We have a membership. Concept. We have a donation box. That's. Pretty much how

we get our money. A lot of times people think there's intent. We have my guy came down he watched for 20 minutes on the store. Thought it was some kind of a Call me a tournament wasn't a call and just people. Like to go kayaking and want to get access to the river. This is a time when we're going to want to paddle quickly but all today to gather ahead diehard New Yorkers who live here for years never even thought about going in the water and just the kind of joy that comes over their face when you take a family or a person who's been here all this life show and you know this is the river. You're right in the outdoors. They're amazed that there's all this great water here and there's all this great activity that they never knew it was here. They've been sitting in their apartments or getting on the train and riding up so they are. Taking a long trip out to the Jersey Shore they don't have to do that they can get in the water right here right here in New York. People a lot of times think of the Hudson River which is dirty filthy it's not the river's very clean and it's getting cleaner all the time. Most of the time it's very nice and peaceful especially in

the morning. There's nobody else out here away from all the hub of the city is quickly quiet. You know it's beautiful. Hopefully the entire river will be covered with but it's not.