Cleaning Up Nyc

[Scarlett]

I thought that New York City in the 1970s was rather grim and full of strip clubs, and a mayor (!) came and sorted it out and turned it all around. I can't find anything online about this. It may not have been a Mayor and I think it wasn't the guy who was there at 9/11. Was there an earlier person who changed NY from being grubby and seedy to being a nice place?

[Clanad]

Edward Koch was mayor of NYC from 1978 until the 1989 as I recall. He had a great deal to do with cleaning up the city... maybe as much as Rudolph Giuliani who was elected in 1994...

[heathfield]

Cleaning up Times Square was an ongoing process over the terms of more than one mayor of New York. Read about it here...

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/1228giuliani-timessquare1228-ON.html?nclick_check=1

[sandyRoe]

They talked about 'zero tolerance'. No crime, no matter how insignificant, should be tolerated.

[jno]

I remember when I first went there in 1980 we were advised not to go on the subway (underground trains) as it was full of muggers and lowlifes. It seems to be perfectly safe now.

I think it was Freakonomics that put forward the theory that it had nothing to do with zero tolerance and police action in general, but with the liberalisation of abortion laws in the 1960s: all of a sudden a generation of potential criminals wasn't being born, and weren't mugging people 20 years later.

[heathfield]

The NYC subway also became safer thanks to the volunteer actions of the 'Guardian Angels'...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guardian_Angels

[sandyRoe]

And the actions of this chap must have reduced the incidents of panhandling on the NY subway.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernhard_Goetz

[DJHawkes]

ooo how's that for a memory of 40 odd years agoi!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Burrows