What the hell is this website?

This is a project that we (OK, that I) started working on in the summer of 2019 and was preparing to launch in February 2020. Then, some things happened: covid, followed by an economic hiatus (punctuated by a fresh round of repression and street riots by NYPD officers), followed by a slow recovery. I decided to wait and see what would happen to the city during the change opportunity represented by covid. Maybe there would be some kind of reset!

Well, there sort of was, in a limited way. We got a small uptick in bike lane miles. We got Open Streets and Open Restaurants (more on those soon). These things were good! But we also got a police department that abandoned any remaining pretense that they cared about street safety, even as the streets became far more deadlier than they had been in the recent past.

Covid isn’t over, but I think enough time has passed that we know how much change we’re going to get from the city in response to the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity represented by a complete pause in business as usual. And the answer is: Not much! So I’m turning this project back on, and we’ll see where it leads. Tell your friends.