A Dream Come True in New York City

The capacity to turn big dreams into magnificent realities is America’s hallmark.  A project that illustrates that fabulously happened in New York City. It revived a piece of New York’s history, preserved it for posterity, and created a unique park for Manhattans, raised thirty feet above street level.

 

In 1847 The City of New York authorized the installation of railroad tracks down Manhattan’s West Side.  Hailed as a brilliant idea, it also caused so many accidents between traffic and freight trains that 10th Avenue soon became known as Death Avenue. A posse of horsemen, the West Side Cowboys, had to ride ahead of trains waving red flags, to warn traffic.

 

The problem was addressed in 1929 with the West Side Improvement Project, which included a Railway Line thirty feet above street level.  It travelled through the center of factories and warehouses, so goods trains could roll right inside buildings without interrupting traffic.  The line worked wonderfully until interstate trucking made rail transport redundant. The last train, of three cars carrying frozen turkeys, ran in 1980.

 

The line was abandoned until the late 1990’s when two young men from Manhattan, Joshua David and Robert Hammond, founded Friends of the High Line to stop it being demolished. They had no experience in urban planning or dealing with the City, but they saw how gorgeous the line would be as a public open space.  

 

They worked hard on their dream and when they garnered City support and funding to create a planning framework over the next three years, the project had wings. By 2003 it had become an project backed by New York City and State. The design team included architecture and landscape architecture firms, and experts in horticulture, engineering, security, maintenance and public art.  

 

Construction started in April 2006, and by June 2012 it was complete.  New York City now has a unique skyline park of 2.3 km of self-seeded wild sections alternated with lush lawns, formal landscaping, benches and boardwalks. Thirty feet above downtown Manhattan’s chaos. And all because two young men had a dream and the determination to see it fulfilled.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Mayors Against Illegal Guns

It’s easy to think of the ultra wealthy as megalomaniac thugs driven by greed; utterly unconcerned about the good of society as a whole. It even brings a measure of satisfaction, especially if you’re one of the have-nots. Generalizations rarely apply to any individual, though, because what’s seen as megalomania and greed can also be huge lust for life and ultra powerful creativity.

It just isn’t black and white. Many celebrities, whether they’re politicians, business tycoons or A-list actors, spread their wealth in philanthropic ways. Some of them, like Oprah and Bill Gates, advertize it, making much of the huge money they contribute to society. In reality, it’s chump change to them which diminishes the heroism a little, but at least they’re doing something. Other celebrities, like Matt Damon, just go about their philanthropic business, using their celebrity status to promote projects but not to boost their egos.

Some celebrities do it all and stay in the news because their philanthropy is really newsworthy. Like New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the 7th wealthiest man in the US, and founder of Bloomberg L.P., who took up the cause of gun control, not just in his own state but around the country.

He leads Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a bipartisan, national coalition of mayors which he co-founded in 2006 with Boston Mayor Thomas Menino. It started with 15 members and now has 1.4 million grassroots supporters and 950 mayors (Democrats, Republicans and Independents) from small towns and major cities in 45 states. The coalition’s campaign, originally focused on demanding a plan, has developed into its current initiative, Demand Action, that calls on Congress to legislate on requiring background checks for all gun sales, making gun trafficking a federal offense and limiting assault weapons and magazines.  

The NRA is fighting back as hard as it can against Mayor Bloomberg and the coalition. The Huffington Post reported CEO Wayne LaPierre saying the campaign is insane and based on a “dishonest premise” – namely that criminals will not submit to the background checks and that the system of tracking will be abused. Fine rationale, that. Might as well dispense with law and order altogether.

They’re tilting at windmills. A report released by the coalition in early March showed results from 21 statewide polls and 41 congressional district polls conducted among likely voters. An average of 86% in the former and 89% in the latter supported background checks on all gun sales.

That Mayor Bloomberg uses some of his money and power to actively promote gun control says a lot about him. He and his coalition are active everywhere, building support for federal regulations to reduce gun violence, employing lobbyists. The New York Times reported on Sunday that Bloomberg recently spent $13.3 million, which included $2.3 million on defeating candidates for an Illinois House seat who were against gun control.

$13.3 million sounds like a lot of money, but it isn’t to Bloomberg – in fact it’s only .05% of his worth. And it’s not as if that’s a static figure, as it would be if he’d just won the lottery. It’s being topped up every second of every day. Still, what he’s doing is truly impressive.

And let’s never forget that anybody who fights this openly for gun control does so knowing they’re putting their own life in danger. Two letters containing the deadly poison Ricin were sent to Bloomberg and the coalition. Another recently sent to the White House and suspected of being from the same source is reported to be under investigation. 

Looking at what Bloomberg and the coalition are doing it’s easy to segue into imagining what could be achieved if the top 10 wealthiest people in US and corporations like Google, Facebook and Apple joined forces on this. Especially if they went all out and committed billions instead of millions. It's hard to understand why they don’t. It’s in everybody’s interests to diminish the power of the NRA and gun manufacturers and create a stable society where people buy gadgets and products instead of guns. A child could understand that.

Public Domain Photos: Mayor Michael Bloomberg

Honor Amongst Thieves? Bloomberg News Reporters Cross the Line

 

It’s not often that something happens on Wall Street that should and could make news but gets mentioned casually in passing instead of being thoroughly investigated. But that seems to have happened in the reporting about the latest accusations leveled at Bloomberg financial data and news by public relation chiefs Jake Siewert of Goldman Sachs and Joe Evangelista of JP Morgan Chase.

The accusations are that Bloomberg reporters have been crossing the line drawn in the contract that states they may not use information gleaned from the terminals for reporting. Accusations surfaced when a Bloomberg reporter noticed that a Goldman executive hadn’t logged in for a few days. He called the Hong Kong office to ask what had happened to the executive. When news of it got to Siewert he called Evangelista, who said the same thing had been happening to JP Morgan’s execs.

Bloomberg investigated, admitted that reporters were crossing the line and breaching the terminals contract and agreed to put a stop to it. One would imagine lawsuits and huge press would have ensued but nothing seems to have really happened. It’s a bit of a damp squib, news-wise.

What hasn’t been explained is that the contract allowed reporters a limited period during which they could access help desks and log ins. If they couldn’t use that information why were they allowed to access it?

Much more interesting, though, is that this isn’t the first time executives have complained about reporters crossing the line. So when Siewert took the latest complaint seriously, some executives – reported on by the New York Times on condition of anonymity – admitted to having tried to use the breach to bargain down the price of the terminals! It’s blackmail. Soft blackmail, maybe, no threats, no bad guys, no anonymous notes, but blackmail nevertheless. In a country where people sue for the most tenuous reasons and even win, that nothing came of this is pretty extraordinary. Honor amongst thieves, I guess.

That anybody in Wall Street would be accusing anybody else of crossing the line is amusing. That execs would even openly admit to indulging in blackmail is testament to how much Wall Street believes itself to be above the law. That’s still amusing but in a rather sinister kind of way. 

What’s puzzling is that these two aspects of the same company exist as bedfellows. There are many complaints that Bloomberg News reports destructively on Wall Street goings on, yet Bloomberg financial data terminals are everywhere. And this despite that they’re by far the most expensive at $20,000 apiece. 

Maybe it’s explained by the fact that Bloomberg News is part of Bloomberg L.P., a multinational mass media limited partnership that’s based in the city of New York. Revenue in 2011 was $7.6 billion. Global revenue for the financial data market was $16 billion. No wonder nobody really challenges Bloomberg. And with all those connections, why would they have to bother reducing the price of their terminals? For once Wall Street is on the receiving end. Of a corporation that  probably controls Wall Street. Which pretty much boils down to one man. Michael Bloomberg, the 7th wealthiest man in the US, owns 88% of Bloomberg L.P.

 

Two Men Who Dreamed Big And Had Gutzpah

The capacity to turn big dreams into magnificent realities is America’s hallmark.  Earlier this year that was perfectly illustrated by the completion of a remarkable New York City project. It revived a piece of New York’s history, preserved it for posterity, and created a unique park for Manhattans, raised thirty feet above street level.

In 1847 The City of New York authorized the installation of railroad tracks down Manhattan’s West Side.  Hailed as a brilliant idea, it also caused so many accidents between traffic and freight trains that 10th Avenue soon became known as Death Avenue. A posse of horsemen, the West Side Cowboys, had to ride ahead of trains waving red flags, to warn traffic.

The problem was addressed in 1929 with the West Side Improvement Project, which included a Railway Line thirty feet above street level.  It travelled through the center of factories and warehouses, so goods trains could roll right inside buildings without interrupting traffic.  The line worked wonderfully until interstate trucking made rail transport redundant. The last train, of three cars carrying frozen turkeys, ran in 1980.

The line was abandoned until the late 1990’s when two young men from Manhattan, Joshua David and Robert Hammond, founded Friends of the High Line to stop it being demolished. They had no experience in urban planning or dealing with the City, but they saw how gorgeous the line would be as a public open space.  

They worked hard on their dream and when they garnered City support and funding to create a planning framework over the next three years, the project had wings. By 2003 it had become an project backed by New York City and State. The design team included architecture and landscape architecture firms, and experts in horticulture, engineering, security, maintenance and public art.  

Construction started in April 2006, and by June 2012 it was complete.  New York City now has a unique skyline park of 2.3 km of self-seeded wild sections alternated with lush lawns, formal landscaping, benches and boardwalks. Thirty feet above downtown Manhattan’s chaos. And all because two young men had a dream and the determination to see it fulfilled.

Watch this video to see my dream