New York City in the 21st Century

NOW - 21st Century

ORIGINS
COLONIAL
AMERICAN REVOLUTION
GROWING PAINS
BIRTH OF METROPOLIS
JAZZ AGE
MODERN TIME
NOW

2000 Rapid growth

According to the 2000 census, New York's population reached an all-time high.

2001 World Trade Center destroyed

The 21st Century in NYC started with one of the most horrific evens in American history.
On September 11, 2001, two planes hijacked by terrorists crashed into the Twin Towers, destroying the complex and killing nearly 3,000 people. One World Trade Center was struck at 8:46 a.m.; Two World Trade Center at 9:03 a.m. The Twin Towers fell, and the remaining 5 World Trade Center buildings followed shortly afterwards.
Cleanup lasted for 8 months.
The event was highly traumatic for the city, and in many ways changed its entire mentality, but it didn't destroy the city and didn’t break its spirit.
Post 9/11, New York became more cautious, but it's larger than ever, more expensive than ever, and more vibrant than ever.

2002 Bloomberg elected mayor

Michael Rubens Bloomberg, the 108th Mayor of New York City, held the office for three consecutive terms from 2002 to 1013.
He was first elected in November 2001, two months after the terrorist attacks on 9/11, a time when many believed that crime would return, businesses would flee, and New York might never recover. Instead, through hundreds of innovative new policies and initiatives, Mayor Bloomberg has made New York City safer, stronger, greener, and more innovative than ever.
According to Forbes Magazine Michael Bloomberg, whose worth is $32.5 Billion, is no longer the richest mayor in the world, merely the 16th richest person in the world.
During his three terms, Mayor Bloomberg has turned around a broken public school system by raising standards, promoting innovation, and holding schools accountable for success.
He has spurred economic growth and job creation by revitalizing old industrial areas and strengthening key industries, including new media, film and television, bio-science, technology, and tourism.
Controversially, in 2008 Bloomberg was able to push through legislation allowing him to run for a third term as mayor, citing that the particularly difficult economic climate and his financial skills warranted his remaining in office. After spending an unprecedented amount of his own money (upwards of $90 million) on the campaign, Bloomberg secured a third four-year term in November of 2009.
He and his girlfriend Diana Taylor took his first vacation since he became mayor after he stepped down in January 2014.

( http://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/archive/bio.page)
(http://www.biography.com/people/michael-bloomberg-16466704#new-york-mayor)

2003 Restoration of The World Trade Center site

The new World Trade Center (WTC) is a vision of downtown New York that combines commercial space, convenient transportation, and a cultural center. The new WTC will include:

Six new skyscrapers (1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7 WTC)
The National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the WTC
The World Trade Center Transportation Hub
550,000 square feet of retail space
A Performing Arts Center

This vision represents an unprecedented merging of architects, artists, and urban developers, including Santiago Calatrava, David Childs, Norman Foster, Frank Gehry, Fumihiko Maki, and Richard Rogers. The singular goal is a grand new urban center for 21st century New York.

2009 High Line Park Opens

One of the most unusual parks in the city is suspended over the street level. It’s the Highline Park.
The High Line was built in the 1930s to carry freight trains delivering meat and other products to the factories located along the railroad.
The freight traffic was lifted 30 feet in the air, removing dangerous trains from the streets of Manhattan's largest industrial district.
When trains stopped running on the High Line in 1980, it was supposed to be demolished.
Fortunately the historic structure was preserved in a form of a park, due to organization called ‘Friends of the High Line' that fought for the chance to give the High Line a new life.

2004 Time Warner Building. Hearst Tower

The Time Warner Center was the first major building to be completed in Manhattan since the September 11, 2001 attacks, although it was already under construction in 2001.
While some New Yorkers noted the uncanny resemblance of the Time Warner Center to the fallen Twin Towers, the building's developer denied any intentional similarity.
The design of Time Warner Center pays homage to the streets of New York: The curvature of the base helps frame Columbus Circle, the angle of the two towers aligns with Broadway, and the space between the towers gives the illusion that 59th Street passes through. In addition, the rectangular patterns on the glass curtain wall overlooking Columbus Circle suggest the Manhattan street grid.

(http://wirednewyork.com/skyscrapers/time-warner-center/)
Hearst Tower

Hearst Tower was the first skyscraper to break ground in New York City after September 11, 2001.
Hearst Tower is the world headquarters of the Hearst Corporation; whose publications include Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping and the San Francisco Chronicle.
The six-story headquarters building was commissioned by William Randolph Hearst and completed in 1928 by the architect Joseph Urban.
The tower – designed by the architect Norman Foster and completed nearly eighty years later – is 46 stories tall.

2012 Hurricane Sandy

Hurricane Sandy was the deadliest and most destructive hurricane of the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season, as well as the second-costliest hurricane in United States history.
The storm became the largest Atlantic hurricane on record (as measured by diameter, with winds spanning 1,100 miles across).
At least 53 people died in New York as a result of the storm.
Sandy's impacts included the flooding of the New York City Subway system, many suburban communities, and all road tunnels entering Manhattan except the Lincoln Tunnel.
The New York Stock Exchange and the three major airports (JFK, LaGuardia (LGA), and Newark-Liberty (EWR)) were closed due to the storm.
Numerous homes and businesses were destroyed by fire, including over 100 homes in Breezy Point, Queens. Large parts of the city and surrounding areas lost electricity.
Thousands of homes and an estimated 250,000 vehicles were destroyed during the storm.
Economic losses across New York were estimated to be at least $18 billion.

NOW The Greatest City in the World!

It's hard to overestimate the significance of New York City.
Relatively young, as far as cities go, New York has become the center of the world in so many respects.

It hosts the headquarters of the United Nations, it's the home for the New York Stock Exchange, Wall Street and Federal reserve; Metropolitan Opera, Broadway theaters, and Madison Avenue; Metropolitan, Guggenheim and MoMA Museums, Blue Note, Village Vanguard, Iridium and hundreds of other Jazz clubs; New York University, Columbia University, and Julliard School of Music are in New York City.

New York is the world's greatest cultural center and a creative force like no other. It is a communication, financial capital of the world and an entertainment mecca.

It's a melting pot, it's the city of immigrants, it's the place which was accepting 'the tired and the poor' from the all over the world and, in exchange, received enormous quantities of talent and creative energy, which shaped New York into what it is now, the greatest city in the world.

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