Related tags:
NewYork + (25)
NYC + (24)
photography + (7)
NewYorkCity + (7)
history + (6)


Users that often use this tag:
The Whelk (3)
obscurator (2)
zarq (2)
Armitage Shanks (2)
netbros (2)

Last month, The Atlantic reported that since 1980s, the price of a metallic NYC taxi license has grown four-times faster than the average home or a brick of gold, claiming it to be a wonderful "inflation hedge." This report proved prescient; on Friday two such medallions (which merely represent the taxi's license) just sold for $1 million apiece — a 42% increase just since August. Also on Friday, mere hours after reading the newsstand headlines, Midtown Manhattan resident Tom Poteat looked down to see a medallion, unattached to its taxi, lying on the sidewalk.
posted by obscurator on Oct 24, 2011 - 50 comments

Manhattan's enterprising, unsolicited window cleaners have often been used as squeegee straw men by aspiring (and entrenched) politicians. Mayoral candidate Rudolph Giuliani railed against the squeegee men in his 1993 campaign, but not without empathetically offering them a viable career alternative.

Once a fixture of NYC life, and even the milieu of a major motion picture [SLRottenTomatoes], squeegeesmithy was since relegated to uptown. But, as America's economic windshield has clouded, the squeegee men have returned in force. [more inside]
posted by obscurator on Sep 26, 2011 - 73 comments