Delirious New York

Who wants to learn more about NYC?  I certainly do.  And when I picked up Delirious New York by Rem Koolhaas, I learned a great deal about the early days of NYC and how the architecture of the city was established starting from farmland to becoming the quintessential modern day city of steel.  Koolhaas does his homework related to who the players were in forming the great city which is parallel to none.  Henry Hudson was believed to have discovered Manhattan in 1609, though Native Americans were inhabiting the land for centuries.  In 1626 Peter Minuit bought the land island for $24 dollars from the “Indians” but the sellers don’t own the property!  The sellers were just visiting.  After a quick history of Manhattan, Koolhaas focuses on the actual layout and architecture of Manhattan and parts of the other boroughs, specifically Brooklyn (Coney Island and the land where the World’s Fair occurred).  The city was greatly influenced by creating places for respite and entertainment.  Coney Island was the “great Escape” in the early 1900s, growing to be the place where upwards to a million people would visit over the summer days to be entertained and wowed by the great fairgrounds created by William Reynolds and Maxim Gorky who created Luna Park, Steeplechase, and Dreamland.   The fantasy lands were pretty intricate with the canals of Venice, a ride through Switzerland, a simulated flight over Manhattan, one that replicated what a submarine would be like, and an incubator building (really! – a place where preemie babies of the Greater NY area were collected and nursed to health in an incubator!), a Japanese teahouse and finally a “leap frog railway” that enacted a near-collision between two rails (Now we can see how Disney was influenced).  In 1911, it all ends with a fire at Coney Island that destroys the Dreamland area.  The conquest continues to make the largest city of skyscrapers ever with the growth and over-development of Manhattan.  Koolhaas shares the pictures and drawings of plans for the city.  The early 1900s brought more and more immigrants (cheap labor) to build more and more glamorous and decorative buildings to include: Flatiron, the Chrysler Building, the Woolworth Building, Empire State Building, and Rockefeller Center.  The growth all came to a halt when the Great Depression occurred, beginning in 1929.  The American ideal of “we can do anything” combined with the money to do anything (cheap labor and intense dreams).   Yes, Koolhaas illustrates how delirious the designers of NY were, and almost were able to deliver if it wasn’t for the depression and later new laws that began to regulate the size and dimensions of new buildings.  Still NY remains the epitome of what money and desire can do to a physical location.  I guess the Middle East buildup, specifically in the UAE, may compare in some ways to the rise of architecture of the 1900s.  This was an interesting read, especially for NYers who crave a historical perspective on the growth of their home.  I enjoyed it and would suggest to anyone else.  The pictures alone are worth reviewing.  Love the picture of the 22 bridges that were to be built to connect Manhattan east and west.  I guess traffic would be addressed if those bridges had been built!