THE HIGH LINE, ONE YEAR ON

The High Line is one of very few places in its fashionable New York City neighbourhood where a person can stroll alone and in generic clothes without
feeling awkward. The 1.45 mile-long path covers a distance beginning on
Gansevoort Street near 10th Avenue and running up to 34th Street in the Meatpacking district. Given the High Line's upcoming one-year anniversary on June 8th, I spent a recent weekday revisiting the park to see whether there were still lines to get in (no) and funny German tourists wandering about (yes).

The park's entrance takes pedestrians up a flight of stairs onto the rails, the first section of which overlooks a trio of actual meat-packing plants: Quality Veal, Weichsel Beef and John W. Williams Inc. Veal & Lamb. Trucks move in and out of a nearby parking lot while helicopters hover above the Hudson River overhead. The wind and city white noise combine into a whir that feels quiet, and the whole area smells like a grilled-cheese sandwich mixed with sea breeze. I watched a photo crew ascend the park's staircase and set up shop near a clump of sedges: stylists in leather leggings, a photographer, and a model in terrycloth robe and Ugg boots. The model shed her robe to reveal a blue mini-dress, and soon the photographer was lying on the ground like GI Joe, shooting upwards. "Good. Nice. Use the railing," he said. I asked a staffer if a permit was required for photo shoots, and she nodded. "They don't have one," she added. A film crew shot b-roll twenty yards away. The High Line paths are lined, in May, with violet wood sorrel, chokecherry, wild geranium and grey birch trees.

Other occupants of the park in the late afternoon included lunchers (a thin woman eating hummus and rice cakes) and sunbathers reclining on the
Diller-von Furstenberg Sundeck. The northern half of the park was undergoing
construction for a soon-to-be-unveiled "water feature" across the street from Colicchio & Sons, Tom Colicchio's new restaurant. Above the restaurant stood a giant dual advertisement for "Sex and the City 2" and Moët champagne. The restaurant was filtering a crowd of gorgeous young women accompanied by much older non-gorgeous men—not an uncommon sight in an area of Stella McCartney and Christian Louboutin boutiques. If this pairing fills a mind with cynical thoughts, well, the High Line is a fine place to make them dissipate.

~ MOLLY YOUNG

Picture credit: David Berkowitz (via Flickr)