Real Estate Boom and Accessibility

From the NY Times

To the Editor:

Both your Feb. 4 Street Level column, “All the Aches of Old Age, and Now One More,” and “Second-Story Story” reflect the loss of needed urban services to developers’ profits, apparently with the acquiescence of the city.

At a time when other cities are making communities more accessible, this is doing the opposite. That loss is greater for Little Neck’s elderly residents (to say nothing of families with small children) who now have to walk half a mile to Douglaston for their daily medicines, and those in wheelchairs, like me, who completely lose access to the dry cleaners and other shops that have had to move up steep flights of stairs.

We know the city wants to be vibrant and alive, drawing in the hip and the new. But the message these articles relay tells the old and the disabled to leave. For whom is the city endorsing this development?

Susan Susman
Upper West Side