New York

Brief information

New York is easy to read through Manhattan: it was here that a small Dutch settlement at the southern tip of the island grew into a city where the main landmarks stand especially close together. The early northern boundary of New Amsterdam ran along today's Wall Street, so the Financial District is not just a business address, but a place where the oldest part of the city's history is compressed.

Today's New York consists of five boroughs, but its recognizable image is largely explained by two things: Manhattan's limited and expensive land and the street plan adopted in 1811. Because of this, the city grew not only outward but upward as well. Skyscrapers, the subway, bridges, the UN headquarters, and Wall Street come together here into one fact: New York became a world center because it constantly reshaped its form for trade, transport, migration, and power.

What to notice right away

It makes sense to compare Manhattan's street grid with Broadway. The avenues run parallel to the Hudson, the cross streets are numbered, and Broadway cuts across the island diagonally and breaks this strict scheme. In the city plan, this reveals the difference between the regular development of the 19th century and an older line of movement.

In Manhattan's silhouette, two groups of high-rise buildings can be distinguished: the Financial District and Midtown Manhattan. The skyscrapers do not stand as a continuous wall because buildings need natural light, so tall towers alternate with lower buildings. The details of the high-rises show different meanings: the Woolworth Building is faced with glazed ceramic tiles and topped with a copper roof, while the crown of the Chrysler Building, with its steel-colored arcs, refers to automobile wheels. Even the water tanks on buildings higher than six stories explain the city's verticality through engineering necessity, not only through ambition.