Prophecies of New York

The city that never sleeps is also the city that forever changes, making its future notoriously impossible to predict. Recently a number of our experts tried anyway, gazing into their crystal balls—and out the windows of our Manhattan studio—to share their vision of what New York will look like in 10, 25, or even 50 years. The result is our new special series, “The Future of New York City.”

Predictions ranged from the breezily optimistic to the wistfully grim; from an explanation of how New York will become even more “green” to a warning that its dependence on Wall Street could prove analogous to Detroit’s fatal symbiosis with the auto industry. The experts themselves varied widely also, from Deputy Mayor Bob Lieber to novelist Paul Auster, a lifelong New Yorker who has witnessed countless changes to the “gracious place” of his childhood—and expects to see many more.

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