Back when the Village was humming along in terms of night life to the West and South of Washington Square, the far Northwest corner of the Village was The Meat Packing District...

But of course, times change, and eventually gentrification and a real springy, edgy hipness came to the area.

There were some pioneering restaurants, and then a flood of development which now also includes the famous Highline Park built up on what was an elevated railroad bed..( to be talked about another time).

Below, a fashion shoot takes place on one of the now hip streets that once were considered a sweaty, smelly place by day and a hangout for all kinds of prostitutes at night...

And here is what I have been able to find on how the transformation took place....

Meatpacking District, Manhattan

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This article is about the Manhattan district. For the "Meatpacking District" in Copenhagen, see Kødbyen.

Significant dates
Gansevoort Market Historic District
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. Historic district
NYC Historic District

An old meatpacking building converted into a boutique

Location:	Roughly bounded by W. 16th St., Ninth Ave., and Hudson St., Gansevoort St.; West St. and 11th Ave., Manhattan, New York City
Coordinates: 40°44′25″N 74°00′25″W
Area:	44 acres (18 ha)
Architect:	various
Architectural style:	various
Governing body:	private
NRHP Reference#:	07000487^[1]
Added to NRHP:	May 30, 2007
Designated NYCL:	September 9, 2003

The Meatpacking District is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan which runs roughly from West 14th Street south to Gansevoort Street, and from the Hudson River east to Hudson Street,^[2] although recently it is sometimes considered to have extended north to West 16th Street and east beyond Hudson Street.^[3]

History

Initial development

The earliest development of the area now known as the Meatpacking District came in the mid-19th century. Before that it was the location of Fort Gansevoort,^[4] and the upper extension of Greenwich Village, which had been a vacation spot until overtaken by the northward movement of New York City. The irregular street patterns in the area resulted from the clash of the Greenwich Village street system with that of the Commissioners' Plan of 1811, which sought to impose a regular grid on the undeveloped part of Manhattan island.^[5]

Construction of residences in the neighborhood – primarily rowhouses and town houses, some of which were later converted into tenements – had began around 1840, primarily in the Greek Revival style which was prominent at the time.^[5] By mid-century, with Fort Gansevoort replaced by freight yards of the Hudson River Railroad, a neighborhood developed which was part heavy industry, and part residential – a pattern which was more typical of an earlier period in the city's history, but was becoming less usual, as industry and residences began to be isolated in their own districts. In the western portion of the neighborhood heavy industry, such as iron works and a terra cotta manufacturer, could be found, while lighter industry such as carpentry and woodworking, lumber yards, paint works, granite works and a plaster mill mixed into the residential area.^[5] At the time of the Civil War, the part of the district west of Ninth Avenue and Greenwich Street and above 10th Street was the location of numerous distilleries making turpentine and camphene, a lamp fuel.^[6]

After the Civil War

When development began again after the war in the 1870s, the tenor of the neighborhood changed. Since it was no longer considered to be a desirable area to live in, construction of single family residences was replaced with the building of multiple-family dwellings, and the continued internal industrialization increased. In addition, an elevated railroad line had been constructed through the neighborhood along Ninth Avenue and Greenwich Street, completed in 1869.^[5] Additional development began in the 1880s when two new markets began operating in the area. On the old freight yards, the Gansevoort Market (originally the "Farmer's Market"), an open-air space for the buying and selling of regional produce started in 1879, and the West Washington Market, 10 brick buildings used for meat, poultry and dairy transactions, relocated to the river side of West Street in 1884.^[5] By 1900, the area was home to 250 slaughterhouses and packing plants,^[7] and by the 1920s, what had been a neighborhood based on mixture of marketplaces became more tightly focused on meatpacking and related activities – although other industries continued to be located there, including cigar making, transportation-related businesses such as automobile repair, express services and garages, import-export firms, marine supplies, cosmetics, printing and many other.^[5] After decades of debate, the High Line elevated freight line was authorized in 1929 as part of the "West Side Improvement Plan", and the New York Central Railroad completed construction, passing through the neighborhood, in 1934.^[5]

Decline and resurgence

The area's decline began around 1960s, as part of the general decline of the waterfront area. Containerization of freight, the advent of supermarkets which changed the distribution pattern for meat, dairy and produce from a locally or regionally based system to a more national one, the development of frozen foods and refrigerated trucks to deliver them, were all factors, but meatpacking continued to be the major activity in the neighborhood through the 1970s. At the same time a new "industry", nightclubs and other entertainment and leisure operations catering to a gay clientele began to spring up in the area.^[5]

In the 1980s, as the industrial activities in the area continued their downturn, it became known as a center for drug dealing and prostitution, particularly involving transsexuals. Concurrent with the rise in illicit sexual activity, the sparsely populated industrial area became the focus of the city's burgeoning BDSM subculture; over a dozen sex clubs – including such notable ones as The Anvil, The Manhole, the Mineshaft, and the heterosexual-friendly Hellfire Club – flourished in the area. A preponderance of these establishments were under the direct control of the Mafia or subject to NYPD protection rackets. In 1985, The Mineshaft was forcibly shuttered by the city at the height of AIDS preventionism.^[8]

Beginning in the late 1990s, the Meatpacking District went through a transformation. High-end boutiques catering to young professionals and hipsters opened, including Diane von Furstenberg, Christian Louboutin, Alexander McQueen, Stella McCartney, Barbour, Rubin Chapelle,^[9] Theory, Ed Hardy, Puma, Moschino, ADAM by Adam Lippes, and the Apple Store; restaurants such as Pastis and 5 Ninth;^[10] and nightclubs such as Tenjune. In 2004, New York magazine called the Meatpacking District "New York’s most fashionable neighborhood".^[10]

Aerial view

Preservation

By 2003, only 35 of the 250 slaughterhouses and packing plants present a century earlier remained in the area.^[7]

In September 2003, after three years of lobbying by the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) established the Gansevoort Market Historic District.^[11] The LPC granted only part of their request: the new district excluded the neighborhood's waterfront, and the restrictions associated with the designation did not apply to the 14-story luxury hotel (the Hotel Gansevoort) which opened in April 2004.^[7] In 2007 the Meatpacking District website^[12] opened to serve the community and those wanting to know more about the area. The site is intended to provide general news and business information. Also in 2007, GVSHP announced that New York State Parks Commissioner Carol Ash had approved adding the entire Meatpacking District, not just the city-designated Gansevoort Market Historic District, to the New York State and National Registers of Historic Places.^[13] The district was listed on the National Register on May 30, 2007, with 140 buildings, two structures, and one other site included.^[1]
In June 2009, the first segment of the High Line linear park, a former elevated freight railroad built under the aegis of Robert Moses, opened to great reviews in the District and the southern portion of Chelsea to the north as a greenway modeled after Paris' Promenade Plantée. Thirteen months earlier, the Whitney Museum of American Art announced it would build a second, Renzo Piano-designed home on Gansevoort Street, just west of Washington Street and the southernmost entrance to the High Line.^[14]

Also in 2009, developers proposed a glass-walled office tower and retail space for 437 West 13th Street that was larger than zoning allowed. The Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation strongly opposed the project, as increasing the scale of buildings in the area the sense of openness in the area would be diminished and the low-scale character of the neighborhood would be eroded.^[15] In the end, the developers were not granted all of the variances that they had hoped for, but a glass tower will be built.

In October 2010, after over two years of campaigning by the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation and other community groups,^[16] the C6-1 Rezoning was passed in the area bound by Greenwich, Washington, West 10th, and West 12th Streets. It imposed an 80-foot height limit and ended commercial bonuses for hotels, both of which will help the continued preservation of the area.^[17]

Gallery

Before gentrification, many meatpacking buildings had become derelict
The Herring Safe & Lock Company Building (1849) at the intersection of Ninth Avenue and Hudson Street at 14th Street
The Apple Store at 14th Street and Ninth Avenue
Hotel Gansevoort (right) and Pastis (left) on Ninth Avenue
The Standard Hotel above the High Line