The Mannahatta Project is one of the best projects about geography and cities that was ever conceived. It is visually shocking and fascinating. It is such a dramatical difference between NYC 400 years ago and now, that the contemporary population the the island should never forget where we are coming from.
A visit to the exhibition reminds you of many aspects of the island that you never considered. First of all, it reminded me that indeed it is an island. My usual walking through NY doesn’t involve the crossing of a bridge. When I have the leisure to walk on the waterfront, I believe it is a river I see that just separates me from the Queens. So I omitted to really conceptualize that Manhattan is an island as Hawaii is an island.
Manhattan was a natural environment not so long ago. The fauna and flora changed dramatically since then; NYC became a totally man-made environment. There is a piece of designed wilderness in the center of it (Central Park) but besides that the visual environment has turned from green to gray. There are no raccoons left in my neighborhood – Murray Hill – but you can still se some in Central Park if you are lucky (late nights are the best time).
Nevertheless, New York seems to remain an eco-system of a new kind: a system where humans are dictating the rules.
400 years doesn’t appear to be much for so many things to happen. The documentary wonderfully showed how each generation and group of people that lived on the island shaped its destiny. I wonder how the post-9/11 generation would change the way we inhabit Manhattan? How will my neighborhood look in 50 years? Will Murray Hill become the new Chelsea (or else)? How will my neighborhood look in 400 years when New York would celebrate its 800th anniversary?
Thinking about my neighborhood I realized how big Manhattan is compared with the world I deal with directly. My world could be summarized in a 5 block radius. This is my home: the place where I find food and shelter (ecological definition of home) and the place where I find comfort and habit (: my definition of home). I think each New Yorker has a 5 blocks home, even if they sleep in a 100 square feet apartment.
Looking at all the aspects of life in Manhattan – the diversity, the huge transit of people, the social gap, the access etc… – I think that they are certainly unique to this city. I lived in many cities since i am a child, but none seemed to me as natural as NYC. By natural I mean that all the things Manhattan is, seem to me obvious and genuine. There is no master-plan behind them. Maybe there is some sort of plan, but it is made out of a multitude of individual plans and so it is organic.
My last remark was about water. New York was completely dependent on water for commerce and transportation when it all started. They had a huge maritime parade, and that made me laugh because today it won’t be the event of the year. We look at water in a very different way today. Is a mean of relaxation (with the beaches and waterfronts). It also seems decorative. It is definitely more pleasant to live in a city by the water, It s entertaining too, with tourists going on tours and locals parting on yachts. We do not see the water as fundamental; but we wouldn’t be here if the ocean was not here too.