It’s hard to make a comparison as I was 31 and dating my future wife living in an East Village studio in 2003 while now I’m 53 with two kids (same wife) living in Hoboken and spending much of our weekends and summers in the Poconos. But I’m still working 3 days a week in Midtown.
I mean I can’t blame New York that I’m not out until 4am anymore hanging out with 20 and 30 somethings every other night.
I think what is happening in NYC is similar to the gentrification that is happening on my side of the river in Jersey City, Hoboken, and Weehawken. You have a lot of these modern apartment buildings going up with concierge service, self contained amenities, usually some commercial space on the ground level. They tend to be big, occupying most, if not the entire block. You basically never have to leave. And they tend to displace old walkups, hole in the wall restaurants, diners, bars or whatever used to be there. So what you sort of end up with is less of a bustling neighborhood in favor of a monolithic glass citadel with a Starbucks and an Anthropologie in the lobby.
A prime example would be the Hudson Yards complex. It’s like this giant mixed-use shopping mall / office tower complex where an evil corporation in the not-too-distant future would market cyborgs.