The Onofframp blog is somewhat dedicated to the belief that things in this world are connected. And not just connected in the obvious way, by say, being next to each other, but connected through some ether-like, cyberspace, celestial glue that pushes our molecules together. There's usually fresh proof of this, and today's book review in the WSJ offers yet another example of worldly connectivity.
Not Here, She Said, the title of the book review by Vincent J. Cannato, weighing in on Anthony Flint's book, Wrestling With Moses: How Jane Jacobs Took On New York's Master Builder and Transformed the American City. Another candidate for a stamp.
I remember reading about Jane when she passed away in 2006. She did rate a news obituary in the Times. And I remember why she was remembered. She lead the fight to keep Robert Moses from building yet another road, this one through lower Manhattan, that would have bisected Greenwich Village: The Lower Manhattan Expressway.
This is the subject of Mr. Flint's book. Ten lanes of elevated highway were planned that would allow traffic to flow (yeah, sure) from Long Island to New Jersey, over Manhattan, in effect. I don't remember Jane Jacobs by name, by I do remember the uproar in the 60s. Air pollution was only one of the reasons to protest.
I remember Mayor Lindsey and Governor Rockefeller taking credit as well for standing up to Robert Moses (the Master Builder) and getting the project shelved. Public pork didn't get built.
So, with all this as a backdrop it's beyond the realm of probability that Kevin Bacon's name should appear, but appear it does.
The reviewer, Mr. Cannato, cites people in other cities who were like Jane Jacobs, and who fought to derail projects that were not felt to be in anyone's interest other than concrete companies.
...At the same time, Jacobs has been shown to be one of a cluster of 1960s activists who, in other cities, rallied in opposition to their own mini-Moseses, such as Ed Logue in Boston and Edmund Bacon (father of the actor Kevin Bacon) in Philadelphia.
The Onofframp submits further proof of the theory of connectivity.
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