Flower Power?

How many times have we complained in these pages about how the city's developers, landlords and politicians have been killing off New York, bit by bit? An awful lot, by our count.

One of the latest examples was reported last week. It seems a lack of parking places and skyrocketing rents have left the city's 120 year-old flower district looking for a new home.

It sounds so nice, doesn't it? "Flower district." It's almost as good as "chocolate district," "ice cream district" or "barely legal district." How peaceful and lovely it must be-and it must smell so good!

Yeah, well, the flower district stretches along 29th St., right around the corner from our offices. If you think it's a joy and a city treasure, we suggest that you try making your way down the block some afternoon-the flower district is a pedestrian's nightmare. Every morning, plants, flowers and small trees in a variety of stands and pots are hauled out of the shops to line both sides of the already-narrow sidewalk, leaving only enough room for a single-file queue of people to try and pick their way through the vegetation to the other side. This is complicated further by the store employees who hang out on the sidewalk all day, sitting on milk crates, shooting the shit and ogling the girls. Add to that the deliverymen pushing their carts of manure, the tourists who stop to admire the "pretty" flowers, the other pedestrians trying to get down the sidewalk in the opposite direction, and the leaves and branches that keep slapping you in the face as you try to shove your way through, and well, we can understand why people buy machetes.

Yes, the flower district is old, it's historic, it's very "New York"-but there are plenty of other things fitting that same description that have been destroyed by economics or politics-but without being such a huge pain in the ass. For once we say, good riddance!