Pandemic: The City That Never Sleeps? How the virus is changing New York

The US metropolis of New York is also changing because of the Corona crisis. The city has lost its hectic pace. And that’s a good thing, some think.

It’s a bright, clear, early summer afternoon in New York. A jazz trio plays at the intersection of Park Avenue and Broadway. People stop, listen, chat. Nearby, young people can do tricks with their BMX bikes and skateboards. A handful of police officers are also here that day, shirts unbuttoned, hats in hand. New York, the US metropolis that used to be so vibrant, is now reminiscent of a small Mexican town during the siesta.

Three months ago, no one would have stopped at the intersection of Park Avenue and Broadway during rush hour. The nearby subway shaft, in which all the main lines of the network converge, would have spat out crowds every minute. Bicycle couriers would have wriggled between honking taxis. Nothing like that. The noise of the city, the traffic noise that was in front
Corona was omnipresent is missing. New York has lost its hectic pace.

Clothing, electronics and sports accessories stores have recently reopened. Shopping streets such as Fifth Avenue or the SoHo boutique square still seem deserted. If you need something, you can order online and collect the goods from the curb.

The cultural scene in New York will suffer from Corona

Alone in the parks is more going on. Seldom has it been so crowded in New York’s 113 square kilometers of greenery. In Riverside Park, for example, there is often no getting through. The city society recently came together at the protest events of recent weeks. About the one against racism and police violence. There were moments when the city’s pent-up energy seemed to be discharging. But everyday life is still characterized by the state of emergency caused by the corona: Times Square is barricaded. If you want to go to an office or store on Broadway between 42nd and 50th Streets, you must show ID. There is an oppressive atmosphere in the subway. Will that change quickly? At least the return to normal should proceed in four phases by August.

“There will be less of everything,” says the Austrian director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Max Hollein. “Fewer visitors. Less exhibitions. Fewer events. ”Gallery owner Alexander Gray believes that the New York art scene is becoming more local, maybe even more provincial. “We have to focus on New York artists and New York collectors.”

Many think: New York is better now than it was before the pandemic

Not everyone thinks that there will be less of everything in New York after the crisis. Some even think that New York is better now than it was before the pandemic. “I feel better in the city than I have for many years,” says the writer and psychotherapist Jeremiah Moss.

For years, Moss has been a sharp critic of luxury New York with its extreme social inequality and the ever-shrinking scope for creativity. He thinks that New York has become more human in the past few weeks. It is also pleasantly quieter because there are no tourists and the super-rich literally fled the city. There is a solidarity among those who have had to persevere in the metropolis that has not existed for a long time. Moss enjoys strolling in a city that was once said to never sleep. And in which now somehow time seems to have stood still.

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