The Financial District is cool, but why anybody would want to live there who doesn't work there is beyond me. It's a short walk from any of the residential areas to any of the major financial firms, it's a miserable slog anywhere north of Chinatown.
And it's not like it's cheap, 800sq ft 1 bedrooms run well above a million dollars.
There's other problems which, at this point, seem to matters of inertia rather than planning:
- NYC is one of the few, dense, major cities without service alleys for trash pickup and delivery. A casual observer might notice that NYC blocks are solid, not hollow, the middle is still full of building. In other cities, with other designs, an access alley allows for service vehicles to enter a mid-block courtyard to provide service functions. As a result both delivery vehicles and waste vehicles block the street with both their presence and the materiel they move in and out.
- The regulations around inspection scaffolding are absolutely out of control rent-seeking. I would be comfortable in saying that there isn't a highrise block of the city that's doesn't have this scaffolding present on it. While it does provide some minimal protection from the elements, it's more like walking through a construction site than a an arcade. The regulations should either be changed to get rid of this nonsense, or to make formal arcades a requirements, thus presenting new facades to the city. I'd actually be in favor of the later since NYC suffers from pretty much the worst of all seasons: cold and wet in the winter, and hot and miserable in the summer.
I love love love NYC, but it's not without its imperfections.