Kips Bay, Turtle Bay, Murray Hill, Midtown East. Whatever you call that general area, there\u2019s a decent chance you think it\u2019s boring.<\/p>\n
Everything seems to be either a doctor\u2019s office, a bank branch or a parking garage. Much of the architecture is made of anodyne postwar steel. (I.M. Pei\u2019s brutalist Kips Bay Towers<\/a> is a cool exception.) If you\u2019re into culture, there\u2019s a big AMC with IMAX. There are frozen yogurt shops. You get it.<\/p>\n And yet, for 15 years now, I\u2019ve been trekking to Murray Hill for my annual physical, and every time, I leave feeling like it has some kind of special New York City magic. Maybe it\u2019s the giddy lightheadedness that comes from fasting all day and then getting blood drawn, or maybe I just like my doctor. (Lucky me.)<\/p>\n But on a recent trip back to the neighborhood, I noticed something for the first time: There didn\u2019t appear to be any tourists.<\/p>\n Now, I\u2019m pro-tourist. They\u2019re good for the local economy<\/a>, and I find it fun when a family of six in Oklahoma State fan gear blithely hops on the 1 train, especially given some of the post-pandemic doomsaying about urban decline<\/a>.<\/p>\n But I also appreciate that New York, unlike some other famous cities I don\u2019t need to slander, isn\u2019t just a museum of itself. It\u2019s a vibrant city where people actually live and work. And Murray Hill, I\u2019d argue, is a paragon of that vibrancy.<\/p>\n In the literal shadow of some of the most famous skyscrapers on Earth, you have a modest, busy little neighborhood full of nurses and doctors, doormen and crossing guards, serviceable diners and better-than-serviceable Indian restaurants. Then, inexplicably, there\u2019s a Dover Street Market<\/a>.<\/p>\n The author trying on a Rick Owens leather ensemble at Dover Street Market<\/p>\n Emily Nadal\/Gothamist<\/p>\n And then you have the fratty transplants<\/a>. Fine! Unlike their peers south of 14th Street, there\u2019s no goofy pretense about living somewhere with Bohemian heritage<\/a>; they\u2019re not butchering the name<\/a>; they\u2019re not spritzing on St. Mark\u2019s Place<\/a>. Junior accountants coming from elsewhere need a place to live, work, go to the gym and drink.<\/p>\n During my recent neighborhood tour, I was talking with a young woman from Massachusetts wearing a \u201cNew York\u201d T-shirt who seemed really excited to go meet a friend at a nearby coffee shop. Which one? She didn\u2019t know the name; it was a place her friend, who lives in the area, \u201cloves.\u201d And that\u2019s perfect \u2014\u00a0it\u2019ll be their place, until it becomes something else for another generation of newcomers.<\/p>\n