11th St Between 3rd Ave and 2nd Ave

   

This is the type of street I hope every person who visits New York gets to walk down at least once. Sure, there isn't anything of particular note, but to me it's more genuine than most any block you're able to find in midtown. The rows of mismatched apartments with their stoops eating into the already-narrow sidewalk, the small stores which sit close to the avenues, the churches and schools which hide in plain sight as you thoughtlessly walk by. It's a microcosm in just a few hundred feet, and it's what this city used to be filled with.

Now days it's harder to find simple block like this. I generally don't lament the new construction too much, but these plain-jane streets are so charming. They offer little-more than a place to live and a way to get from one avenue to the next…beyond that they're not a destination by any means. It's what you often see when you turn on Sesame Street or any other program which presents a semi-idealized version of urban life. 

9th St Between Broadway and 3rd Ave

   

Somehow this near-desolate block, which begins with a Toys-R-Us Express in the shell of an old Blockbuster video, isn't as depressing as it could be. Acting more as a pathway between Greenwich village and the east village (with a quick stopover in Astor Place), these two blocks are comfortably nestled between the two bustling neighborhoods.

The first half is a dark street thanks to the looming presence of 770 Broadway, which seems to hold AOL, Nielsen and several other media companies under its roof. The second half is slightly more welcoming thanks to the inclusion of some smaller buildings, local shops and even a few rays of sunlight. Looking south you can spot some of the newer buildings that have been popping up around here and the Bowery. These alien structures are becoming more and more assimilated with the skyline everyday. I wonder how much longer it'll be before our vintage brick buildings begin to look like the out-of-place ones.

Delancey St Between Allen St and Ludlow St

   

Every time I find myself on Delancey street I have to do a double-take to make sure I'm not on Houston, or even 14th. It sounds foolish, but there are many striking similarities. While the other doppelgangers are far more polished thanks to the past 20 years of gentrification, Delancey still remains a bit rough around the edges. Regina Spektor's song "That Time" has a lyric:

"Hey remember the time when I found a human tooth down on Delancey?"

...which is seems very appropriate, but less and less plausible as time goes on.

While the nearby Tenement Museum celebrates the neighborhood's questionable past, the new SVA Ludlow Residence seem to give a glimpse into the future. A controversial building, the brown-brick-mosaic facade is a strange addition to the skyline. Personally, I don't mind it. It's nice to see something that isn't glass and steel. The blocky structure isn't anything thrilling (It reminds me of a telco headquarters that you'd find in the 1960's – especially with those narrow window columns), but I have to commend the architect for the clever use of color. It certainly doesn't appeal to everyone, but I'll be very interested to see how tastes evolve as time goes by. There are also plenty of complaints about the influx of "snobby art students". I can't comment on that assessment (I was one of said snobby art students), but personally I'd much rather have a group of artists than a group of miscellaneous NYC undergrads.

1st Ave Between 7th St and 9th St

   

A block away from the tree-filled oasis of Ave A and Tompkins Square, the decidedly different First Avenue shares only a handful of things in common with it's eastern cousin. While much of the "indy" village feeling it present, the overdevelopment of the past decade or so has left this stretch of blocks looking like a battered line of trendy storefronts, each catering to another fad of the past 10 years.

Cutting right through St. Mark's Place, the street is lined with a rainbow of colorful storefronts–mostly restaurants. A few surprises along the way, such as a used record store, help to remind you that you're in the east village, where a premium is placed on impractical businesses simply for the sake of nostalgia and authenticity.

4th St Between Ave A and 1st Ave

How is it that a neighborhood generally personified by its unchanging landscape and classic architecture finds itself overtaken by a series of superblocks at the very last moment? These large housing projects feel so utterly out-of-place amongst the shorter tenements that dominate the rest of Alphabet City that it made me wonder whether or not the neighborhood began before or after Avenue A. In a strange way, I would feel better if these buildings weren't considered part of the same neighborhood but rather were simply a block away in a different world.

The middle of this block is home to a classic-looking New York school, P.S. 751, which is also known as the Manhattan School For Career Development. Right next door to the school is McKinley Playground. Now, maybe it's me, but would you name a place of recreation after a man who looked like this? Like several other streets in the area, this wide open block allows for an abundance of street parking, making it feel more like a garage than a street.

Bowery Between Prince Street and Houston St

As the dizzying rate of gentrification continues along the Bowery, it becomes more and more of a spectacle to watch the changes. Many parts of the historically-depressed Bowery are home to specific industries such as lamps or furniture, or in this case commercial restaurant supplies. In the age of online retailers providing everything you could ever imagine, it's strange to see 10 or 12 shops in a row all selling the same basic supplies – yet here they are. But while old grease traps are being power-washed on the sidewalk for resale, across the street strange buildings such as the New Museum sit as if they had always been there.

South of Houston it's still possible to see remnants of the neighborhood's former self, though they're very quickly being turned over to developers. The past decade has seen the whole area north of Houston transformed into something entirely unrecognizable to anyone who hasn't visited since the early 90's.