Photo of the Day: Stranger in a Strange Land—or, Back in Midtown

A week and a half ago, for the first time in 14 months, when COVID-19 restrictions went into effect, I ventured back into New York City. In meeting friends for lunch, I was as curious about what I was about to encounter as I was apprehensive, given the rapidly changing and confusing guidelines issued by the Center for Disease Control (CDC).

The bus ride through northern New Jersey into the Lincoln Tunnel contrasted strongly with what I saw and heard even only a few weeks ago, though the evidence for a change in ridership habits was still apparent. In the spring of 2020, with the lockdown in place, I walked by buses that, though once standing room only, now had only one or two passengers during the morning rush hour. So few people were on board that it made me feel as if I were viewing a ghost bus.

Though a good deal more people were on board the New Jersey Transit bus I took that Monday morning, plenty of seats remained—even with the four seats behind the driver roped off. (The driver was additionally protected with a glass shield.) I was relieved to have the opportunity for social distancing.

As late as last fall, friends were still telling me that pedestrian traffic in Times Square had diminished markedly—especially during the Christmas season so critical to retailers.

Stepping off the bus and out of the Port Authority terminal, I did not feel as crestfallen as I might have at year’s end—there were a good number of people on the streets. Still, something had changed, in a way that this shot, which I took from Times Square, looking uptown, can’t convey.

I didn’t get my first real sense of how much was different until I met my friends at an English-style pub in the Garment District pub. Though still anxious about being inside, I took comfort in the considerable distance between our trio and the closest customers in the restaurant.

In fact, one of my friends at the table indicated that, in this same restaurant, at a comparable hour, he would have been lucky to get a seat here before the pandemic.

Analysts are talking about the pent-up demand that restaurants will experience from people anxious to celebrate the end of isolation with friends. I am sure there is something to that—and indeed, compared with the desperate situation at this time last year, when so many restaurants were gauging how to move towards a take-out model, the situation is vastly improved.

But I suspect that restaurants in many cities such as New York will still find surviving a difficult matter. Many will depend on lunchtime spending by the white-collar sector to supplement expenditures by friends and families.

Even with tourist bookings accelerating, the damage to the office sector will continue—at least until Labor Day, when many companies will be able to put their post-pandemic plans in place and see how early returnees to old spaces are faring.

I believe that some of the damage to office space will be permanent. Over the course of a year, companies have proven that they can operate remotely if need be. They no longer have the need to have all their employees in their buildings five days a week. Some companies reduced their workforce so dramatically during the pandemic that it will take years to reach their former levels--if even then. This means that fewer workers will be making lunchtime purchases.

In some ways, the post-pandemic city may be better. My friend Rob, for instance, looked forward to fewer people on subways during rush hour. “Who wants to get on trains packed like sardines?” he noted. “After all, there is a quality-of-life issue involved here, too.”

You can forgive New Yorkers who blinked at what they saw all around them as the restrictions came down. Everything looked familiar but wasn’t—much like the post-pandemic city whose dimensions we won’t be able to grasp for weeks, months—even a few years.