Having lived in the LA basin, we have a mental image of a megalopolis. New York City (Manhattan in particular) is different. It’s a megalopolis to be sure, but it’s got a different personality than any other city. Every large city has it’s high density area, but New York City is a high density area. High rise buildings are everywhere and they go on for miles and miles. This massive high density area is a big part of the city’s personality. The streets are saturated with trucks, busses, taxis, cars and the omnipresent bike messengers. Nearly all of the bike messengers use throttle e-bikes, so they rarely pedal. Some of them don’t even bother to throw a leg over the seat, they ride side saddle! It’s the damnedest thing we’ve ever seen! The traffic is so intense that most people walk (or use mass transit) to get around.
The city is so large that we took two bus tours (one at night and one during the day) and a boat tour. The night tour was spectacular. The lights on the buildings and bridges create a magical effect. Given it was after the regular work day, folks were out and about walking around. It really did make for a delightful trip. The day trip was on a hop-on hop-off bus. This tour started off with a bang (literally)! While we were getting on the bus, another bus collided with ours. It wasn’t a major incident, just a fender bender with really big fenders.
Even though we had the bus to cover longer distances, we still ended up walking for miles. We visited a bunch of places we had heard about like Sacks 5th Ave department store, 30 Rock (the NBC studios), the Empire State and Chrysler buildings, the Met, Times Square, Central Park and numerous others. We got a feeling for the different areas of this city: Downtown, Uptown, SoHo, NoHo, Tribeca, East Village, West Village, Greenwich Village, the Financial District and so many others. The area is so large and so intense that it’s hard to get you mind around it even when you’re there.
