Fifth Avenue between 56th and 57th streets is one of the most bustling corridors in Manhattan, but that’s changed this week as new protections have been put in place surrounding Trump Tower, the home of America’s president-elect. Access to the brass and glass skyscraper is limited by roadblocks and police, a restriction that will stay in place until Trump departs his namesake tower for the White House on January 21. The block, one of Manhattan’s main shopping corridors, and just steps from Central Park, is oddly quiet.
The atrium of Trump Tower, a privately-owned public space, remains open to the public but as David Dunlap notes in the Times, it “[takes] some determination even to get there” involving obliging conversations with police.
In the wake of Tuesday’s unprecedented Presidential election, protests have erupted across New York City with Trump Tower as their nexus. On Wednesday, Mayor de Blasio spoke to whether the protests would move to the nearby park. “There is a clear tradition in this country that we try to accommodate protests as close to the point that people are protesting,” he said. “When they come to City Hall to protest—even though I don’t like what they say all the time—we don’t say: ‘Nope, sorry, you’ve got to be over by the river.’ It’s an American tradition. It’s a good one.”
Would a presidency abided over from Midtown Manhattan be doable? “I think it would be untenable, given modern security realities and the need to govern,” De Blasio told the Times. After all, even the airspace above the tower has been deemed a no-fly zone with the government poised to use deadly force should an aircraft pose an imminent danger.
Meanwhile, in Chappaqua, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is going on hikes in the public and posing for photos with supporters while at it.
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