Question about New York City in the 80's and 90's.

[fdub]

I don't mean to sound like a tourist, but I LOVE NYC (I am from the DMV by the way lol), but I recently went there this past summer and it was a very nice experience overall except some new yorkers being really rude when you ask them a question. I think the city wan't the cleanest, but i was told that back in the 80's and 90's it was much worst as far as it being real dirty and very grimy. SO my question is for those who were around those era's, how was NYC in the 80's and 90's as far as what you've seen? I'm very curious..

 

[DCAllAfrican]

I am from DC. I naturally have a dislike for anything NY. All hype.

But Man when I went to NY for the first time, I felt it in the air. ( Beans: )

There was just something about being there that made me feel so damn good. I can't even explain it. It must be nice to be from a city that everybody is on your ****. Damn.

 

[bronxstreets]

it was bad back in the days ......mayor giuliani did a good job on cleaning the city especially times square

i remember being 6 years old walking around 8th ave and 42nd thru 44 st with the family and seeing prostitutes

 

[fdub]

I am from DC. I naturally have a dislike for anything NY. All hype.

But Man when I went to NY for the first time, I felt it in the air. ( Beans: )

There was just something about being there that made me feel so damn good. I can't even explain it. It must be nice to be from a city that everybody is on your ****. Damn.

I noticed a lot of folks here hate New York, but I never understood why.

 

[DCAllAfrican]

I noticed a lot of folks here hate New York, but I never understood why.

DC has always felt like they were in the shadow of NY. Market wise. Music wise (which is why go-go was created), and overall importance in the country.

 

[GTA 809]

Crack rocks. Crack rocks everywhere.

 

[tommyicerocking]

the Bronxs in the 70's 80's 

but it would be dope living there as a kid...Graffiti era 

 

[fdub]

DC has always felt like they were in the shadow of NY. Market wise. Music wise (which is why go-go was created), and overall importance in the country.

Good Points... I have asked people here from DC would they move to new york and most of them said it is too busy for them, but my thing is, if you're from DC (Which is a city), how would NYC be any different? I mean, it's both the city life..

 

[DCAllAfrican]

Good Points... I have asked people here from DC would they move to new york and most of them said it is too busy for them, but my thing is, if you're from DC (Which is a city), how would NYC be any different? I mean, it's both the city life..

DC is a little slower than NY. When you think of NY, you think of CROWDS of people everywhere. Of course it isn't like that everywhere you go. But I can understand why folks say things like that.

 

[solexsup]

My mom told me when she first came to NY in 85 it was terrible. 42nd was full of those peep show shops and prostitutes everywhere. Trains were full of graffiti, my mom got her chain snatched on the train. My pops got stabbed in the leg around the same cus someone wanted to rob him.

I didnt realize how much Giuliani cleaned up the city until i took a history of new york class last semester.

 

[shatterkneesinc]

back in the days, you will think twice staying out late

 

[fdub]

My mom told me when she first came to NY in 85 it was terrible. 42nd was full of those peep show shops and prostitutes everywhere. Trains were full of graffiti, my mom got her chain snatched on the train. My pops got stabbed in the leg around the same cus someone wanted to rob him.

I didn't realize how much Giuliani cleaned up the city until i took a history of new york class last semester.

Oh wow.. SO movies in the 80's that were filmed in NYC wasn't make believe as far as peep show shops and the prostitutes.. It looked like a grimy city back then..

 

[solefood229]

Waits for Ninjahoods input, I know he got some stories about the heights

 

[water]

Waits for Ksteezy's stories. 

 

[diego]

Was it it that you want to know? It was as grimy as you've seen in tv.
Graffiti on trains, prostitutes, violence, drugs.

All around thug life.

 

[jtplatnum]

Good Points... I have asked people here from DC would they move to new york and most of them said it is too busy for them, but my thing is, if you're from DC (Which is a city), how would NYC be any different? I mean, it's both the city life..

not to derail here...but...city life in one city is nothing like city life in another city. I'm from Cali and I live in SF and I love SF, but NYC is the greatest city on earth (I spent 8 years there). DC is nowhere near a comparison. Nothing (IMO) is even close to NYC...only possible contenders Tokyo and Paris.

back to the thread...i had a friend that grew up in bushwick...a bit older than me but we still kicked it a lot. he told me a couple of cool stories about when he was a lil kid growing up in bushwick...

he said dogs used to run the streets in gangs. like literal stray dogs. they'd run in packs and they could (and would) really mess people (and other dogs) up. his favorite was a german shepherd he nicknamed 'king' that used to lead the pack in his neighborhood. one day he saw king lying on the sidewalk near the gutter...he went over to see what was up and found king was dead. he said he cried for days

he also told me about the night of the 1977 (or was it 197 blackout hit new york...once again, as a little kid, he said he was just watching the street out his window (broadway in bushwick) and all he saw were flashlights running in and out of shops. pitch black. madness.

sounds like it was a much more 'raw' city back then. much more authentic.

i'm sure someone can add some better stories...

 

[sheistbugz]

Because parts of the city looked like this. You had places like the South Bronx and parts of Brooklyn where it was common practice to actually burn buildings down and collect the insurance money.
Terrible quality of life, about 4-6 murders daily through the 80s into the 90s, terrible policing until they put the Broken Window policy into effect, crack cocaine, pre-Rockefeller drug laws, abundance of guns, the city was much more lawless.
In 1990 there were 150k cars stolen in NYC in one year, 2200 murders, and hundreds of thousands of other serious crimes.
After 9/11 the city has become progressively more safer and cleaner, but is becoming much more congested.

 

[jhawk826]

When they say you didn't belong in a certain neighborhood or go there during a certain time, they really meant that with Howard Beach and Bensonhurst being among the more prominent examples.

The gang lifestyle wasn't an exaggeration in the Warriors. People weren't walking with their faces painted like the Furies, but gangs did wear apparel like vests and jackets with their gang name on it. If they were in the wrong neighborhood, they had to take off their colors while in enemy territory or they had to fight their way out. NYC always had a gang problem from the Five Points during the Tammany Hall era to the rise of the Bloods in the late 90s. When I hear people say Chicago being the Gangster City, you can't help but chuckle.

Times Square was nothing like what you see now. It was common to see robberies, prostitutes on the the stroll and assaults/stabbings while walking through that section. You really had to be thorough back then.

My dad has a lot of good stories of everything from the drug scene Uptown in the Bronx to the Polo boosting. He could write a book on his experiences growing up here. Led a very colorful life.

 

[solecity]

NYC in the 80's and 90's was rough a lot of violence, drugs, heroin, gangs.. Hunts Point was flooded with prostitutes and junkies were seen everywhere. A lot of places were damaged by graffiti and most locations looked like a map out of Call of Duty. I used to live in the South Bronx and growing up there was beyond terrible and tough. Other places that were rough but changed over time was Harlem. Harlem changed extremely for the better. In terms of rude people in NYC, is always been the lifestyle. People have this "mind your Business" mentality thus is why many do not help each other when in danger. Even staring at the wrong person for more than 5 secs results in an issue of " You know me son?" or The f*** you looking at son?"


Still love my city, I know reside in Providence, RI and some things havn't changed around here.

 

[krazy88s]

I liked the city in the mid 90s tho.

 

[ravagebx]

It wasn't until I got older that I realized how raw it was. As a kid I would always see crack viles on the ground, prostitutes on corners and abandoned houses. Those are some of my earliest memories. Things got much better late 80s and into the 90s.

 

[debso]

well, i'll shed some light.

ny was ROUGH. typical ****:

-someone got robbed for their coat/sneakers like every other night on the news
-dime/nickel bags everywhere
-trash everywhere
-bums laid out on the sidewalk
-drug dealers
-graffiti was everywhere (much more than now)
-africans (no offense) with the carpets laid out selling bricks in boxes pushing them off as radios
-africans on the corner selling watches
-mad ppl strung out
-gunshots in broad daylight
-random killings for no reason. ****** didn't give a ****

it was nothing for someone to run up on someone and blow their brains out. didn't need a reason.

-lots of ppl got robbed
-food was better
-the culture was better

anybody my age or older has stories of wild **** for days.

 

[debso]

i mean, don't get me wrong, it was bad but who knew? ask any of us and we'll tell you we had the best time THEN.

we were poor and didn't have **** and didn't know it. or rather it didn't mean anything. it was NY then. now...? eh...
THEN?? i can't even explain it. **** isn't the same.

i didn't know that thats what it wasn't supposed to be like until i went to visit my cousins in VA. it was so clean there...

i mean it was dirty, nasty, it smelled and there were syringes, dime bags, etc. where the sidewalk meets the streets and we were used to it and thought it was normal.

42nd st was def a different place (reading above my post).

did i mention the food was better? the whole culture, the whole **** was better back then. this isn't on some nostalgia thing, either. it is what it is.

the bronx was ROUGH.

my mother and i used to visit one of her friends. we'd ride the F train into the city, catch the D, ride that for a few, get off and talk through THE GATE. we wouldn't dare walk up the stairs and out of the station.

we did.

until one of her sons got shot in the back of the head point blank one day getting food from a bodega and the other son another day, same week.

and the part of queens i'm from was rough too. imagine going from one rough area to an area even more rough and thinking your **** is normal and their **** is crazy?

as far as queens?
my aunt used to roll with ****** that ran with supreme. she used to date a ***** that was on the run for raping his niece and cutting her tongue out so she wouldn't tell.

THATS old school ny.

 

[sunshineblotters]

When I went to NYC me and my half sister found New Yorkers to be very nice.

 

[ccastro02]

You mean late 70's and 80's. By like 92/93 nyc was already starting to clean up. By 96 nyc was pretty much a cake walk from there on.