Slaughter on Eleventh Avenue

Today while wandering aimlessly (trying to break in a new pair of sandals) I happened upon the elevated High Line which runs along the west side of Manhattan from 34th street down to Gansevoort Street. The High Line was built in the 1920s to spice up the manufacturing industry in New York & to make 11th Avenue safer for traffic, since the rail had run at the same grade as the street, which had affectionately come to be known as "Death Avenue." Unfortunately the Great Depression hit & the project turned out not to be as lucrative as had been expected. The rail was abandoned in 1980 (its final delivery reportedly was a cargo of frozen turkeys) & left for vegetation to run amok. I first saw aerial photos of the High Line at an exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art a few years ago but wasn't sure what I was looking at. This long trestle of wildlife splintering a landscape of looming skyscrapers. It literally looks like one of those surreal Scott Mutter posters (eg, man with briefcase walks across lake towards a giant escalator). From a sidewalk vantage, the High Line is completely undistinguishable. It blends seamlessly into the warehouses and ironwork. At one point while following the line I thought I had lost it, only to realize I was standing directly under it. Apparently there is talk among city bigwigs of developing the line into a public park.

Some photos of the overgrown trestle can be seen at the Friends of the High Line site.


Incidently, this photo & others like it are evidently reversed - because the Empire State Building appears to lie west of the tracks, which isn't the case. The camera must be pointed north because the tracks end at 34th Street - meaning if you stand on the tracks at the far northernmost point looking south, you wouldn't be able to see the Empire State Building, which would be 45 degrees to your left. Just sayin'.