New York

New York is the biggest city in the Usa, with almost 18 million inhabitants if we count the whole metropolitan area, or only 7 million in the central area. The density of the population is over 9 thousand people per 1 sq km.

New York covers the area of 780 sq km and has five major parts : Manhattan, Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island and Brooklyn. The blach quarter – Harlem – is in northern part of Manhattan.

The origainal inhabitants in the area where New york is todya ewre native Americans and the oldest part of New york bears a Native name – Manhattan Island. The island was bought from the Natives by the Dutch in 1625 for goods worth US$ 25. The original name of New York was New Amsterdam. In 1644 the British captured the city and renamed it New York. Because of its favourable position it soon became an important trading port. By 1775 its population was about 25 000.

In the southern part of Manhattan island there used to be a wall against Indians; the place is now called Wall Street. It is the centre of financial life with the most important stock-exchange in the world.

Manhattan City Plan
The city has been built so that the streets and avenues follow a geometric pattern and are numbered. Streets ren east-west and avenues nort-south (e.g. The Fifth Avenue which is the shopping centre of NY, with many exclusive shops, boutiques, etc.)
Only a few of the streets and avenues – the oldest ones – have got their names, for example Wall Street or Broadway. Broadway runs north-south nearly the whole length of the island and it is the centre of New York`s cultural life with the famous Broadway theatres. The island is washed by two rivers – the East River and the Hudson River.

Skyscrapers
New York is famous for its Manhattan skyline – a large number of skyscrapers on a small area. They started to build skyscrapers there because of the lack of space and the high price of land on the island. The first skyscraper here were built in 1903 and 1913. a skyscraper uses a steel frame rather than the walls to support the vertical load. Now they are built with the hepl of computers which can take into consideration all possible phenomena such as wind, or earthquakes. Skyscrapers are also an interesting sociological phenomenon as the building is a small city itself – it offers residential quarters, office space, parking lots, restaurants, shopping facilities, fitness centres, swimming pools.

Living in a skyscraper is expensive; one unit in Trump Tower sells for US$ 700 000.
The World Trade Centre (WTC) was highest skyscraper built in 1973, was 417 m high, had 110 stories. Other interesting and beautiful skyscrapers are Empire State Building, 381 m high, built in 1931, the Chrysler Building (1930, 319 m), the Citicorp Centre (1977, 280 m), the PanAm Bldg., the Trump Tower etc. There is also the UN building there by the East River.

The only quiet place, where however it is dangerous to go after dark, is Central Park where also famous rock concerts take place.

There are many attractive places where visitors like to go, either on ships or over the New York bridges. The most well known is the Brooklyn Bridge. There are many islands in this area – Roosevelt Island, Coney Island and liberty Island with the Statue of Liberty. The Statue of Liberty is a copy of the small statue given to the USA by France in 1887 when celebrating a century of the USA. The high Statue stands near the port and it was usually one of the first sights for many immigrants to the USA. It is considered to be a symbol of hope and freedom. There are words on the statue base : „Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the Golden door.“

New York is an important industrail city and business centre, as well as the biggest port in the USA. There are four airports in New York, and perhaps the most famouse of them is the J. F. Kennedy airport. There are 15 TV stations, 39 radio stations, over 100 hospitals, 29 universities (Columbia University is the best of them), many cultural institutions, galleries, such as The Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim`s Gallery,etc. New York has the largest subway (underground) system in the world, it runs 137 metres under the city.