Century 21 Aftermath - This Ain't no Holiday Inn: Down and Out at the Chelsea Hotel 1980-1995 - page 237

thing led to another, and one person led to another. And this was aside from the
fact that I lived at the Chelsea.
Now in Brooklyn, I feel like, “Yes, this is where everybody is.” In particular,
in Greenpoint, I feel like, “This is where art is being made.” Now I feel like I'm
also “in the zone.” But because the Brooklyn zone is so widespread, I don't see
any other artists. I know everybody's out here somewhere, but the art geography
and the art world have changed so much.
MARY ANNE ROSE
The whole Chelsea neighborhood used to be more alternative. But now people
have moved in and changed the neighborhood, and that has taken a huge amount
ofmoney.MuchofithascomefromgayswithmoneymovingintoChelseafrom
the adjacent West Village. I mean, two men together earn a better income than a
man and a woman.
JERRY WEINSTEIN
The hotel has changed along with the neighborhood. Some of our transients who
stay here for short visits are business people, with Whole Foods executives, and
Google is in the neighborhood. So the people we get now are a different bunch.
And the rooms are much different. We've upgraded all the rooms.
JOHN ZINSSER
Gentrification is the easy answer. Now, when I go to the East Village, I still see
all the people I saw in the 80s. They still live there! Everybody lives in these
rent-controlled apartments, and what, at one time, was a group of young artists
andmusiciansandwriters—nowthey'reallfiftyyearsoldandwanderingaround
the same streets.
With all this talk of how New York has changed, it's all so much the same. If
I go to Twenty-third Street, it's more the same than it is different. It's shockingly
the same. But like everybody else, I go around pointing places out and saying,
“This used to be here. That used to be there.” This Rip Van Winkle-ism.