“Here the skeptic finds chaos and the believer further evidence that the hand that made us is divine.” --Robert Moses

For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to start the day with a long walk. And, even though the train to Penn was running two hours (two hours!) late, I chose my route carefully, wanting to swing by ABC Home, Madison Square Park, Washington Square, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory building, and so forth and so on, wending my way ultimately to the Surrogate Court building where my papers were waiting.

I will not wax sentimental about the beautiful coffee mug I have from ABC Home, nor will I remark upon the soothing nature of the parks. Instead, I'll borrow from Rebecca Read Shanor theme [The City That Never Was] and take this opportunity to mention what isn't there-- for example, the Lower Manhattan Expressway or Lomex, the six-lane elevated highway that Robert Moses proposed run the length of Canal Street to connect the Holland Tunnel to the Manhattan and Williamsburg Bridges.

Noooo, that wouldn't have changed the Village and SoHo too, too much. As Jane Jacobs' wrote, expressways like this "eviscerate" cities: "This is not the rebuilding of cities. This is the sacking of cities." Luckily, Rocky put the final kibosh on the plan in 1971.

One of the streets that would have fallen victim to Moses' expressway is Mercer Street, one of my favorites. It is quiet and cobbled, and always feels as empty as a Sunday morning. Many of the buildings are former small factories with beautiful cast iron fronts. Walking along there is very soothing and sorta time-warpy; yet, it is difficult to picture it either as a street of working factories or in the Fun City years, crowded with trash, etc. Therefore, I am not sure exactly to where or when one is warped back to, but there is a definitely a sense of removal from both the present and the "true" past.

This feeling is intensified as you look down Mercer towards Canal. Looking up, you should see the Twin Towers and, again, you are hit with the feeling that time, to borrow from Shakespeare, is out of joint. Yet, if Moses had had his way, it is the street that would be missing. Maybe that is why things are not where they belong on Mercer Street and, right down to the buildings' facades, they are not what they seem. Perhaps this isn't really New York after all.