Old and New on the Lower East Side: A Look at Preservation and Development

For more than a century, the Lower East Side served as the immigrant hub of New York, eventually becoming the most densely populated neighborhood in the world. But the historic fabric that has kept it together is fraying at the edges. Today, not a single historic district protects the Lower East Side, leaving the physical remnants of this critical chapter in U.S. history endangered. Join urbanist and preservationist Patrick Waldo as he explains the threats, challenges, and some of the worst offenders in the battle to save the Lower East Side. We’ll see the rubble of a landmark house of worship mysteriously burned to the ground, soon to be turned into a high-rise apartment building. We’ll visit the site of a historic Yiddish vaudeville theater, the facade of which its new owner promised to keep, only to be demolished. And we’ll discuss the limits of preservation, as we stop by one of the most important radical organizing spaces in the city, its building beautifully restored but turned into a high-end sneaker store. Along the way we’ll ask, what would Jane Jacobs think? And what can be done to protect the historic Lower East Side?