Streets You've Never Heard Of: Lispenard Street Edition

If you've ever gotten confused between West Broadway and Broadway and wandered around SoHo in a suit for 45 minutes worrying because you're really late for an interview and sweating because it's 5000 degrees but nevertheless buying one of those coconuts with the straws in it from Canal Street (overrated), then you might have been on Lispenard Street without knowing it. In more habitable parts of the city, 45th Street might be helpfully labeled West 45th or East 45th, just to remind stupid people where they are. But downtown, West Broadway, Broadway, and East Broadway are three different streets. Take note.



Lispenard runs the two blocks from West Broadway to Broadway just south of Canal Street. Crowd-wise, if Canal Street represented New York City, Lispenard would be Barrow, Alaska. I don't have any pictures of Canal yet, so imagine that classic picture of a dozen people in a phone booth, but spread out over about a mile of fish-smelling streets. I hate Canal Street, but somewhere inside of me, I think I'd miss it if it was gone. Like the movie North. Here's what Lispenard looks like:



Notice the theme of dangling fire escape ladders. This continued all the way up the street, at least 4 buildings in a row. I come from a place that when there's a fire, you walk out the front door with your dog and laptop and drive to a hotel to go back to sleep, so I guess I just don't understand these, but I can't really picture how they work. Do they just slam to the ground to make stairs? Is there a release button somewhere? What if someone's underneath it (like in the picture)?

Anyway, there's a post office garage on the block (possibly the back of the Canal Street Post Office, which is a pretty cool building if you're looking to get out of the air conditioning for a while), and the truck in the middle is some kind of super postal transport vehicle that I wish I took a better picture of.



Naturally, there were a lot of mail trucks parked on the block, which ruined the quiet residential feel, but I guess the dull roar of illegal commerce drifting down from Canal Street was already doing that.



Finally, at the Broadway end of Lispenard was another example of When Capitalism Attacks, a nice building that used to be the National City Bank of New York (click the photo and you should be able to see it etched in the building), but that's now home to a Payless Shoes. I guess it fits, because this building is right next to Canal Street, which is basically Payless Everything.