The Wars of The Moses

Civic Talk, April 4, 2007
Museum of the City of New York

I went to another of the discussions held in conjunction with the several Robert Moses exhibitions being shown simultaneously around town. The title promised a heated debate. It turned out to be far from heated, nevertheless interesting, but rather incoherent. An impression.

Timothy Mennel, author of Everything Must Go: A Novel of Robert Moses’ New York, a semi-fictional revisitation of the development of New York written as a Ph.D. dissertation in geography at the University of Minnesota, was asked to give his perspective on Moses.

I am interested in the unknown Robert Moses. Biographical infomation was completely left out of the exhibitions. Probably by choice, because it was felt that Robert Caro’s book was too personal. We don’t learn anything about Moses as an individual. The consensus seems to be that ‘first he was good, than he was bad’. What was it like to be Robert Moses? What are the places that shaped him?

Mennel is convinced that places shape people.

Early in his career Moses lived and worked on Hog Island, in the 1920s the largest shipyard in the world, now home to Philadelphia International Airport. As part of the World War I effort, the US government contracted American International Shipbuilding to built ships and a shipyard at Hog Island. That is when Moses saw how public funds could be used to direct the private sector. He lived most of his life next to Carl Schurz Park on the Upper East Side. The FDR Drive passes underneath the park in a half-tunnnel that leaves the roadway exposed only on the side facing the East River—and Moses did not actually hear the traffic noise. It explains why the idea that highways are intrusive, did not register with him.

Elizabeth Barlow Rogers, founder and first president of the Central Park Conservancy, talked about Moses as a son of the reform movement.

In the late 1900s parks were places to enjoy the scenery, and beauty really counted. Early 20th century the city no longer took a protective attitude, it was a period in which stewardship went down and vision was lacking. In the 1920s the park was in very bad repair. When Moses became Parks Commissioner in 1934 all that changed. He believed parks should provide opportunities for recreation and started out to build swimming pools, playgrounds and tennis courts. He created new park and beaches. The boldness of it all, the earth movements, it was immense. By the 1950s Moses had become a major fundraiser for Central Park and he set out to improve it. But none was really done with respect for what was already there. There was no respect for the beauty of it all. Even though the original park design had been accomodating to changes as well, and it would have allowed for the cultural transformation.

Herbert London, president of Hudson Institute, a conservative public policy research organization that promotes global security, prosperity and freedom, admitted that he was not an expert on Robert Moses. He feels that Moses was treated unfairly.

Moses saw cars as chance to provide people with the opportunity to get out of the congestion, to go to beaches and rural areas. Think of what he did to make Long Island accessible. He invited New Yorkers to the beauty of Long Island and Jones Beach. He did not get nearly enough credit for the architectual wonders he created, such as the parkway to the Niagara Falls.

The discussion that followed focused on the fact that Moses at least got things done. Nowadays community groups are fighting every proposed plan to a point where nothing gets done anymore.

Barlow sighed.

There is this thing that ‘you’ve gotta stop them’ and now the Parks Conservancy has become one of ‘them’. Even repaving broken pathways has become an issue, with people trying to stop us because we are not only trying to fix it, but actually trying to improve the look and feel of the paths. That makes us trying to change things, and therefore we have to be stopped.

The discussion was moderated by Henry Stern, a veteran in public and civic life. He served 9 years elected to City Council as member-at-large from Manhattan and was appointed commissioner of Parks and Recreation where he served for 15 years. He is now the president of NYCivic, a watchdog that takes an active role in outlining and defining public and civic matters.

Stern wrapped it up.

Community groups are in a way as bad as Moses was. It is a preservation cult. We had NIMBY, now we have BANANA; built absolutely nothing, anything near anybody!