Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Well, we started the program today with a shout out to all the moms out there in advance of Mother's Day on Sunday and we're going to close out this week by celebrating a birthday. It's a late birthday for the late great New Yorker Jane Jacobs, who would have turned 106 years old this past Wednesday. Jane Jacobs was a humanist urbanist, she called herself. Say that five times fast, humanist urbanist. Someone who spent her time thinking about the health of a city and its communities and neighborhoods.

She said the city should be designed in a people-centric way. That was in opposition to much of the work of Robert Moses, her nemesis, another famous or sometimes infamous urban planner, whose approach was more automobile-centric in his day. He's the reason that the suburbs are designed with cars in mind as much as they are in the New York metro area in particular. He's the reason we have the Staten Island Expressway, the Cross Bronx Expressway, cutting through communities in the way it does, the BQE and others. Jane Jacobs is the reason that we don't have a Robert Moses Expressway running through Soho.

It was activism that she led that tanked Moses' plan for a Lower Manhattan Expressway to connect the Williamsburg Bridge on the east side to the Holland Tunnel on the west side of Manhattan. Jane Jacobs argued in favor of public transit over highways and particularly in favor of walkability instead of cars. Listeners, in honor of Jane Jacobs' birthday, with all of that as preview before I even tell you what the caller question is, we're going to invite you to call in and tell us about your favorite part of just walking around your neighborhood. Let's say something you would like to show a stranger from anywhere, from maybe below the surface of the ocean, your favorite thing to show people if you take a walk in your neighborhood.

212-433-WNYC. We're going to say we're doing this in honor of Jane Jacobs' 106th birthday. 212-433-WNYC. What's your favorite thing to show people as they visit you and you walk around your neighborhood with them? Whatever neighborhood. We want to get a real diversity of neighborhoods represented here. Call in if you're anywhere in the five boroughs. Somebody else from Norwalk, Connecticut can call in or maybe we already know what it is for our last caller. Anybody anywhere in New Jersey or wherever you are, what's your favorite thing to show people when you walk around your neighborhood? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692.

We should say we got the idea for this from the Municipal Art Society of New York, which every year holds what they call Jane Walks, which take walking tours in the spirit of Jane Jacobs, slow, steady and all about observing what around the walkers, the group that Jane Walks have been on. The groups, sorry, that Jane Walks have had been on hold over the pandemic, but guess what? They're back in person for the first time this weekend. Even as we use this as a hook for a call in here, we want to give a plug for the in-person ones there. You can go to mas, for Municipal Art Society, mas.org for more details. They'll be holding them all weekend long, all around the city.

In honor of that, in honor of Jane Jacobs' birthday week, we're holding a Jane Walks of the air right now. In that spirit, call and tell us about walking around your neighborhood and feeling connected to your urban space and shout out one thing that you would like to virtually show the rest of our listeners. 212-433-WNYC. We'll take your calls right after this.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now to your favorite thing to show people as you walk around your neighborhood. We'll start with Paul in Kensington in Brooklyn. You're on WNYC. Hi, Paul.

Paul: How are you doing, Brian? Thanks for letting me be on the show. I want to say living in Kensington, it's a very nice neighborhood. I like walking in and around the neighborhood that's not so car friendly, more bike friendly I will say, with my wife. Sometimes we go for nice walks with my wife late at night. I'd also like to say happy birthday to my wife, whose birthday is today. She also shares with Jane a lovely birthday.

Brian Lehrer: Way to sneak it in there. Anything in particular you would tell people to look for if they walk around Kensington one day?

Paul: Well, it's a beautifully tree-lined neighborhood. A lot of old Victorian homes. It's very decorated during the holidays. A lot of people are very festive around the season, so you'll be in for a treat. Large sidewalks and no cars parked on the street. Very bike friendly and pedestrian friendly and very close to Prospect Park.

Brian Lehrer: Paul, thanks for calling in. What's your wife's first name?

Paul: Nadia.

Brian Lehrer: Nadia, happy birthday.

Paul: A long time listener.

Brian Lehrer: Happy birthday.

Nadia: [unintelligible 00:05:30].

Brian Lehrer: Nadia was there to hear it. Cool. Paul and Nadia, thank you very much. Thomas in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi, Thomas.

Thomas: Hi. I live on the Upper West Side across from Central Park, near a body of water called the Pool. Some of your listeners may know that every body of water in the park has a different name. This is a Pool. It's surrounded by beautiful weeping willow trees and it feeds a waterfall which spills into a stream called the Loch and that in turn feeds the Harlem Meer. You can walk around the Pool along the Loch and come out in the Harlem Meer.

Brian Lehrer: Nice. Thank you very much. We're going to go a little uptown from there next to hear from Maira in Washington Heights. Hi, Maira, you're on WNYC.

Maira: Hi. First time caller, long time listener. Can't believe it. I'm home, not working today. I live technically in Washington Heights, but my neighborhood is Sugar Hill. When I walk to work, I work at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, I'm a librarian there, I walk along Edgecombe Avenue. It's the part where it overlooks the Jackie Robinson Park and it's high up and you can see the rest of Harlem, the Bronx, Yankee Stadium. It's a really beautiful walk and it's really peaceful and quiet. There is wonderful trees and gardening. They take really good care of it. That's one of my favorite areas in my neighborhood.

Brian Lehrer: What's the closest subway stop if somebody just wants to take a train up there, or down there depending on where you're starting from, for me it would be down, and take some of that walk?

Maira: It's the C train. You get off at 155th Street.

Brian Lehrer: Maira, thank you very much. Christian in Richmond Hill, you're on WNYC. Hi, Christian.

Christian: Hi, Brian. I'm a big fan. You're a treasure. Another treasure that I love here in Richmond Hill is Forest Park. It was also designed by Olmstead and it's a gorgeous park. I take my dog there and it's a wonderful place.

Brian Lehrer: Anything within Forest Park? I've been there. I know it's pretty big there in Queens and even connects to some other parks, if I'm thinking of part of that geography right. What do you like to do in Forest Park?

Christian: I love to walk there, take my dog. It has a beautiful dog park. As you know, it has a carousel. There's tennis courts. There's a bandshell. It's huge. People don't really know about it, but it's a great park and I love to walk there with my dog.

Brian Lehrer: Christian, thank you very much. We're going to stay in Queens and go to Eddie in Astoria next. Hi, Eddie, you're on WNYC.

Eddie: Hi. I live in Astoria and my favorite thing to do when I bring people walking around the neighborhood is Astoria Park. I live a block from it. The cool thing about it is when you go under Hell Gate, which is a bridge, it's a train bridge that goes through the park and go across the river, you get a very weird, strong wind from the west that you don't get anywhere else. The moment you walk away from it and it's gone. It's a haunted little windy thing going on in there, in Astoria Park, Queens, Astoria.

Brian Lehrer: Right on the water over there?

Eddie: Yes, right on the water. Plus it's beautiful. You see Manhattan, you see the East River and it's beautiful there.

Brian Lehrer: Eddie, thank you very much. We're going to stay in Queens again and go to Helaine in Bayside out east from Astoria. Hi, Helaine.

Helaine: Hi, how are you? I watch your program all the time. It's wonderful.

Brian Lehrer: We'll put it on television, so you can really watch it. I'm kidding. Go ahead.

Helaine: Excuse me for that slip of tongue. I hear your program every day. I want to say that Bayside, Queens is absolutely beautiful, walking down individual homes with beautiful unusual plantings on my way to Little Neck Bay. I cross over the Cross Island Parkway, and there's a wonderful walk along the bay. It's very restorative and very beautiful. The neighborhood itself has some beautiful parks. The John Golden Park, Cunningham Park, Crocheron Park, and they were all beautiful. I'm very fortunate to be in this area.

Brian Lehrer: In full transparency, this is very near where I grew up. I love that spot that you referenced along Little Neck Bay, where certainly people can go and walk. There's also a great bike route that goes along there. Just like the caller from Astoria was talking about how you can see Manhattan from that spot on the water. What a city of water we are, what a remarkable city of water we are, all over the place. From there, you can see the Throgs Neck Bridge going to the Bronx, a little ways down you can see the Whitestone Bridge also, which are beautiful structures in their own right.

Helaine: That's right.

Brian Lehrer: Great walking.

Helaine: Fort Totton. Fort Totton Park, it's beautiful.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Let's go down to Crown Heights. Amanda, you're on WNYC. Hi, Amanda.

Amanda: Hi. This is for every family with young children. We are so lucky where we live. If you take the BQ to Prospect Park, you can make a loop in our neighborhood and you can go through the children's corner of Prospect Park, you get the carousel, the Prospect Park Zoo, you can go up to the nature playground. Then if you're there on a Saturday, you can walk up to the Grand Army farmers market. Then you can hit the central library, the Brooklyn Museum, and then you can come back down to where you started by going through the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. It's the most amazing walking loop for kids and families.

Brian Lehrer: Great one, not just a spot, but a loop.

Amanda: We just love it.

Brian Lehrer: Amanda, thank you so much. Alicia in Westchester, you're on WNYC. Hi, Alicia. Where in Westchester?

Alicia: Hi, hello. I'm in Larchmont.

Brian Lehrer: What have you got for us?

Alicia: Well, the first few times I went out for a walk after the pandemia, after the worst had passed, I noticed that the colors of the greens and the colors of the flowers were much stronger than they used to be. I don't know, because the people were not around. Also the birds, I was walking on the sidewalk and they were all lots of birds, and they were not flying away. They were just walking in front of me. I said, "Well, evidently the absence of humans has something to do with it."

Brian Lehrer: I guess so. That's a good story and a good story on which to end. Thanks to all of you for calling in and shouting out some of the walks in some of the many neighborhoods in our area. That was wonderful. I want to give a shout-out one more time to the Municipal Art Society of New York which inspired this call in because they will be doing, for the first time since the pandemic, the first time in three years, their in-person Jane Walks in various places in New York City this weekend. Inspired by the urbanist, the urbanist humanist, or did she say humanist urbanist? It was one of those. Jane Jacobs. Jane walks from the Municipal Art Society around the city this weekend.

For more information, you can go to mas.org. Their initials for Municipal Art Society M-A-S, mas.org. We thank them. As always, we thank all of you. That's The Brian Lehrer Show for today, produced by Mary Croke, Lisa Allison, Amina Srna, Carl Boisrond, and Yesica Balderrama. Our interns this spring semester are Anna Conkling, Gigi Steckel, and Diego Munhoz. We say goodbye to Anna and Diego this week. Thanks, you are great interns with a lot of great ideas. Good luck out there. Meghan Ryan is the head of Live Radio. I'm Brian Lehrer.

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