Closing Bell: "A Really Greater New York"

The blog Kottke.org picked up an interesting find from Strange Maps. The blog published a map from 1916 which suggested the vast potential of expanding New York into the adjacent waters and connecting it with Brooklyn. The theorist, consulting engineer and city planner Dr T. Kennard Thomson, said, “I propose to add, by a series of engineering projects, fifty square miles to Greater New York’s area and port foothold. At the same time this will mean an addition of one hundred miles of new water-front. New York’s City Hall would become the center of a really greater New York, having a radius of twenty-five miles, and within that circle there would be ample room for a population of twenty-five millions, the entire project to be carried out within a few years. Many have said ‘It can’t be done.’ The majority of engineers, however, have acknowledged the possibility, and I have received hundreds of letters of encouragement.” Strange maps (and possibilities), indeed!