Talk:Houston Street (Manhattan)

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Dropped:

Houston County, Georgia is also named for William Houstoun.

Actually, according to the Georgia county's official website, it is named for Ga. governor John Houstoun. Are the two men related? Wish I had time to check... Ellsworth 21:40, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Downtown?

The entry currently says this: "Houston Street is a large thoroughfare running east - west north of the downtown area of the borough of Manhattan..."

Aside from the fact that the sequence of words "east west north" is inherently difficult, would anyone like to defend the assertion that "downtown" in New York City begins at Houston Street? My personal downtown starts somewhere between 14th and 23rd.

I agree with you. I'm not sure I'd describe anything higher than 14th st as being a "downtown" neighborhood, but Greenwich Village is unarguably downtown, even though it's north of Houston. By the way, the Lower Manhattan article states that "'Lower Manhattan' and 'Downtown' are often roughly synonymous," but I don't buy this at all. To me, Lower Manhattan means below Canal--and especially the Financial District. Downtown much more generally refers to the southern portion of the island.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 13:09, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
Agreed, downtown has never meant above 14th to anyone I know. Although I don't have anything to back me up off-the-cuff, In my five years living here Dowtown signified below 14th Street. --DavidShankBone 13:27, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
OK, I'm going to work up a useful rephrasing for the lead sentence there. - Corporal Tunnel 14:58, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
Come to think of it, it's not even true that it's one block south of First Street, except for that little bit of it between First Avenue and Bowery. - Corporal Tunnel 15:02, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] First Paragraph

I've entered a proposed new intro paragraph, which I think is more accurate and concise, and which solves the "east-west north" word sequence problem. Speaking of which, is there a compelling reason to Wiki-link to "east" and "west" in this context? Isn't that a bit silly? I'm leaving it for now because that's the way it was when I came to it, but there are plenty of links in there already - it may be more distracting than useful. - Corporal Tunnel 17:04, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

The article's first paragraph is much better and more accurate now. I like it.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 17:08, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Corrected recent edit on the street grid. Despite the Wiki article on the subject, the numeric street grid does not start at 1st Street and Avenue B. There is no 1st Street at Avenue B; 1st starts at Avenue A. The 1811 plan may have been drawn for Avenue B, but any sliver of 1st that might have been there initially was presumably lost when Houston Street was widened. I'm not really sure how useful this information is, as compared to the original statement that the grid starts immediately north of Houston, but whatever - should be fine as is. - Corporal Tunnel 17:19, 17 August 2006 (UTC)