The piece in the
Times on Sunday about Seventh Street included the following passage:
Near the eastern end of this stretch is Tompkins Square Park, that wonderful 10.5-acre patch that continues to lure the bohemian legions yet resists gentrification against all odds. Originally planned as a farmers’ market, it has been used as a public park since the 1800s and has weathered many seasons since. On any given day, there might be a band making noise, codgers playing chess, schoolchildren all in a line, and a Police Department van slowly cruising through. The echoes of demonstrators yelling “Die, Yuppie Scum” may be very faint these days, but there is no Shake Shack ... yet.
The mention of Shake Shack in the East Village prompted a sudden pain in my groin. In the comments,
Jeremiah Moss noted: "the writer is practically begging for a Shake Shack in Tompkins Square Park."
Does the author know something that we don't? Or is this just
wishful thinking?
So... what if a big, mooing cash cow of a Shake Shack opened in Tompkins Square Park ... just like the one in
Madison Square Park?
As Jeremiah recently wrote: "We know what happens when popular, higher end businesses are introduced into a neighborhood. Like the mongoose and gypsy moth,
they have a powerful and irreversible effect on the ecosystem."
What would the release of a Shake Shack mean to the Tompkins Square Park and East Village ecosystem? [
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