Introduction
Walking south along Brooklyn Avenue NE, between NE 42nd and 41st Avenues, I mind my way through the construction and over the roots dying to escape from the pavement. Unobtrusive, nondescript, the block of residences to the right sits quietly. Students sometimes come and go from the otherwise dormant apartment buildings, but save for the construction workers on Brooklyn Avenue, or perhaps a landscaper keeping the Identity Apartment building clean, the block is quiet relative to its bustling neighbor, the “Ave.” But, this discrepancy is not mere coincidence: close observation reveals that this block is indeed deeply historically contingent, that the block traces the city’s larger history of urban development. From the few natural remnants left that provide hints of what the block was like before development to the block’s mix of architectural styles and time periods in its residential buildings, even the mere fact of the block being entirely residential buildings instead of commercial enterprises, these features point to a process of urban development that mirrors larger city-wide, national, and global phenomena.