Gone With the View

By Yvonne Vávra

I once shared my space with a beloved New Yorker. We lived together, even though, technically, my companion had to stay outside. But there he thrived, right outside my window, just a stone’s throw away: a water tower. My guardian, my muse, my friend. It was the first thing I saw each morning and the last before I turned off the lights at night.

One morning, as I left, I noticed a few men gathering around it, looking all important. When I came back later that day, my water tower was gone, like it had never been there at all. I cried for hours, and everyone I knew had to listen to my tragic tale. The tower had such a magnificent presence that its absence seemed almost grotesque. The change was mind-boggling, leaving me feeling out of place in my own home.

The next day, the men returned, hauling fresh lumber. Before sunset, my tower was back, refreshed and standing tall.

I hope the Upper West Siders on Broadway and 76th Street will be as fortunate as I was. When news broke that 2160 Broadway, the four-story building on the northeast corner of 76th Street — once home to a First Republic Bank — was slated for demolition, I couldn’t help but think of the people now dreading the upheaval outside their windows. A demolition, certainly. Construction, without a doubt. And then, perhaps, darkness.

The marketing materials for the sale boasted up to 17,700 feet of unused air rights, which means something tall could rise on the corner — something that would block the views of residents at 2166 Broadway. What is now a view of tree-lined Broadway might soon be replaced with the cold face of brick or glass or worse.

It’s disorienting when familiar views suddenly disappear. What we see every day, consciously or not, becomes the backdrop of our lives. We rely on these views for a sense of consistency. When they vanish, something feels deeply off.

The city experienced the most dramatic version of this with the loss of the Twin Towers.

There was no going back to how we viewed the city before — or the world, for that matter. The picture was shattered. But even smaller disruptions to the familiar landscape can feel unsettling. Ever since parts of the El Dorado towers on Central Park West were swallowed by scaffolding, I try not to look. It rips me out of my visual comfort zone. Changes like these feel like the neighborhood got bangs. It’s confusing to the eyes, but the best way to deal with it is by giving it time.

Last week, even time started to mess with our sense of place. When the time and temperature display screen on the Apple Bank building overlooking Verdi Square was removed and loaded onto a truck bound for an unknown destination, a cry went up across the Upper West Side. Even though West Side Rag quickly reported that all was well and a new display would be installed soon, readers expressed how sad they felt that the clock had vanished from their lives. One reader shared that they immediately felt lonely when the display went dark. Another swore that no watch or weather app could ever “take the place of the first view of the time and temperature when I wake up in the morning.”

Change is tough, especially when it hits close to home. Whatever is outside our windows, lives with us inside. It’s part of our intimate space — a part we have no control over. I have no say over the guy who comes out onto a roof in my view almost every day at the same time. He stands there for about half an hour, smoking something and pouring his thoughts into the sky. He has no idea, but his habit gives me a sense of stability and comfort.

My friend Gordon, who lives in Chelsea and once had an uplifting view of the Empire State Building, had to watch as a high-rise grew right in front of it. Day by day, the intruder climbed a little higher, and with it, Gordon’s stress levels. Oh, and his frustration, resentment, sadness, and sense of powerlessness, too. Good thing he’s a therapist.

By the time the Empire’s spire disappeared, he was almost over it.

Whaddaya gonna do, huh? Change and loss are part of the deal with the city. Being New Yorkers, we experience it so often that we’re trained to accept and get over almost everything. Like the city, we beef a bit, then keep going, finding the chances in the changes. Even a high-rise in front of your nose might offer a window to look into and see something inspiring. Even a missing time display might free us from the pressures of a clock-watching world. And even a vanished water tower… nah. Fuhgettaboutit. New York tough stops right there.

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Yvonne Vávra is a magazine writer and author of the German book 111 Gründe New York zu lieben (111 Reasons to Love New York). Born a Berliner but an aspiring Upper West Sider since the 1990s (thanks, Nora Ephron), she came to New York in 2010 and seven years later made her Upper West Side dreams come true. She’s been obsessively walking the neighborhood ever since.

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