Great cities are always changing, and as property developers and big businesses move in, often the first neighborhoods to lose their character are those that operate on the margins – places where economies are decidedly underground. Even though a lot of that gritty neighborhood character is lost to history, there are audioguides out there that capture the essence of times gone by. Next time you’re headed to New York, London, Tokyo, or Paris, plug in to one of these guides to experience a different, seamier side of city life.
Times Square, New York City
Perhaps the most obvious example of a once-gritty neighborhood that’s lost its edge is New York’s Times Square. To look at the chain restaurants, family-friendly stores, and hoards of tourists that clog the area today, there’s no real sense of the adult theaters and sex shops that populated the streets from the 1960s to the 1990s. An audio walking tour ($1) from the Soundwalk company guides you through the streets and attempts to recreate those bygone days with the help of a narrator well-versed in its salubrious history.
Authored By Karen Gardiner Dion – See the Full Story at Sherman’s Travel
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