When Jay McInerney declares a neighborhood dead, well, that means something. We think. Writing on the demise of the Meatpacking District in New York, he notes that the district he terms "the new date-rape row" may yet get its revenge on crass opportunists:
Who knows, though . . . the ghosts of those slaughtered animals, if not the trannie prostitutes, may yet haunt the developers? dreams. Before dawn, as the last partyers leave Cielo and PM and Lotus, giant rats patrol the cobbled streets and terrorize hotel guests on the highest floors of the newest towers; and among the entrepreneurs of the area one hears whispers of ineradicable molds and mites imbued in the old brick walls of the former abattoirs.N.B. photographs by our own Eliot Shepard.
· Meatpacking District Got So Popular Nobody Goes There Anymore [NYM]