New York City day-trip, January 2008

There is always something happening in New York, but some times are better than others to visit. Scott is starting to buckle down to work on the FM sequel to Airwaves of New York, so he wanted to spend a week in The City to continue his research. Meanwhile, both Clear Channel and WNYC are in the process of building new studios downtown, so it seemed like an opportune time to visit. I couldn't spend the whole week, so we planned that Wednesday, January 16th, would be our “Manhattan day” to see the new facilities under construction. I took the train down from Boston, and met Scott at the Municipal Building in Manhattan, to visit the old WNYC studios before they move out. (For scheduling reasons I was not able to see the new studios. That just means I have to come back after the move; which is OK—it's not like a I need another reason to return to New York.)

From there we went to visit Josh Hadden at the new Clear Channel studios in the AT&T Building; it's likely that they, too, will have moved in by the time I next get down to New York. Taking a cab over to the Lower East Side, we had lunch at Katz's Deli, which I cannot recommend (unless you like eating establishments with bizarre service arrangements and tiny, filthy bathrooms). From there we went up to NBC at 30 Rock and got to see (but not photograph) the new combined NBC/MSNBC/CNBC news studios as well as the adjoining NBC Nightly News set. (I would have liked to take the official public tour, but our schedule was already packed.) We ended the day (after a brief stop at Leonidas to buy a box of truffles) at WPIX, getting a full tour from Director of Engineering Mike Gano, and spending half an hour talking about TV with VP/GM Betty Ellen Berlamino. (I was apparently not up to snuff here as I don't watch much television. I should have said that I watch baseball—although not the Mets, of course, for which WPIX has the broadcast rights.)

After WPIX we walked back to Grand Central, where I took a subway ride back to Penn and then successfully avoided falling asleep until after boarding my train.