Building use in West Chelsea has transitioned from manufacturing to warehousing to industrial. During the middle of the twentieth century, highways began to replace rail as the preferred method of freight transportation. By the 1960s, large sections of the High Line were already being dismantled with traffic along the railway halted altogether in 1980.
Beginning in the 1960s, the number of large industrial firms headquartered in Manhattan significantly declined. This decline continued into the 1970s as disinvestment decimated the city’s previously thriving manufacturing economy. The effects of the decline stretched to related sectors as well, taking a toll on trucking, warehousing, and wholesaling. By the 1990s, New York could no longer claim to be an “industrial city.” This economic shift led to new uses for the large spaces of the old industrial buildings, one of the more innovative adaptations being nightclubs in West Chelsea.
The “gritty industrial neighborhood,” as it was described in the New York Times in 1997, began to attract art galleries and related businesses, many which were being priced out of SoHo. Among the attractions for artists of the old industrial buildings were the ground stories featuring wide expanses of column free space, 13-foot ceiling heights, and eight-foot-tall operating windows available in many of the buildings.
Today, West Chelsea remains a thriving district for galleries and art-related businesses, with more than 50 percent of the district’s buildings dedicated to these uses.
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| New York Central Railroad - Meat Packing District - Eleventh* Avenue & West 12th Street - ca. 1911 Man on horse is a NYCRR Watchman / RR Policeman a/k/a "West Side Cowboy" escorting the locomotive as required by NY City law. Source: trainweb.com |
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| Source: Gaytravelabout.com |
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| The Meatpacking District now includes retail, galleries, restaurants, and hotels. Source: Meatpacking District Improvement Association map 5/2/09 |
Source:
Christopher D. Brazee & Jennifer L. Most, New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission "West Chelsea Historic District Designation Report" July 15, 2008
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